


Angering the Storm

by randomcheeses



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Stargate SG-1
Genre: Adventure, Crossover, Gen, Humor, OC-Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-28
Updated: 2010-08-28
Packaged: 2017-10-11 07:07:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 36,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/109780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/randomcheeses/pseuds/randomcheeses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ba'al learns that you should not piss off the Oncoming Storm</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Unknown Girl

"Ouch."

That was the first word Janet Fraiser had heard from the SGC's newest guest since she'd entered the infirmary. To be fair, it was an expected utterance from someone who was having sharp bits of stone pulled out of her arm. But the fact remained that the girl hadn't said anything else. She'd just glared at everyone, (if looks could kill, then half the SGC would already be in the morgue) and pressed her lips together in the universal body language meaning: I won't talk and you can't make me. So there, you jerks.

The girl had arrived at the SGC, having been forcibly pulled through the 'gate by SG-1 when they'd returned early from their scouting mission to P3X-529. Despite the very particular rules surrounding acceptable circumstances for bringing aliens back to the SGC, Col. O'Neill and his team hadn't even got the mildest rebuke from General Hammond. Mostly because it wasn't quite clear if the girl was an alien human. Of course, she _had_ been found on a different planet. But the fact that she was wearing Nike sneakers and a blue hoodie with the letters U S A clearly printed on it had confused matters somewhat.

What the General currently wanted figured out was; if she was from Earth, how had she ended up on P3X-529? (The Russians had already denied involvement.) And if she wasn't from Earth, then how had she gotten her rather Earth-distinctive clothes. The girl had so far declined to speak and General Hammond wasn't about to order the interrogation of an apparently defenseless teenager. In any case, she was injured and Doctor Fraiser had made it clear that there would be no asking questions, politely or otherwise, until her patient was bandaged and given a full check-up.

###

Having treated her patient to her satisfaction and run as many of the usual tests as she could, Janet Fraiser was now in the boardroom with General Hammond and SG-1. She wished momentarily that they wouldn't look at her so expectantly, because she didn't really have any good answers right now. Thankfully, the General was still speaking, giving Janet a moment to collect herself. She shook her head hoping to clear it, but only succeeded in making Major Carter look at her in concern.

The General finished speaking to SG-1 and then nodded to Janet, prompting her to announce her findings. She cleared her throat. "Well, as far as I can tell from the limited amount of tests we've been able to run, she's human. Not badly injured, but she's still not speaking either. She certainly looks as if she's from Earth but I have no way to confirm that medically. I've also found nothing to explain how a teenager from Earth could end up on P3X-529."

Once Janet had finished speaking she found SG-1 and the General looking at her in mild confusion.

"Limited amounts of tests?" the General questioned.

Janet smiled in amusement. "Our guest apparently has a fear of needles. She wouldn't let me take a proper blood sample and I didn't think it would be a good idea to force the issue, considering her current mental state. The last thing we want to do is make her more withdrawn then she already is. However, I did manage to collect a little from the stone shards I pulled out of her arm. Those samples aren't exactly the best, but nothing harmful has been found in them so far."

The General nodded, satisfied and turned to Col. O'Neill. "Colonel" he said, "how exactly did you come across this girl?"

O'Neill shrugged. "Just like I said in my report Sir. We'd been ambushed by Jaffa and were withdrawing to the 'gate. That's when we saw her. She was curled up in front of the DHD, holding her injured arm and looking frightened as hell. Then the Jaffa caught up with us and we pulled her through the 'gate first to stop her getting shot in the crossfire."

O'Neill gestured to Teal'c. "T here thinks one of the Jaffa started aiming at her on purpose because he seemed to recognise her. Can't comment on that myself Sir, as I was a little busy with my P-90. But T's pretty sure, aint'cha big guy?"

Teal'c inclined his head. "Indeed" he said formally. "That particular Jaffa began to snipe at the girl, once he saw her. He considered us a secondary target."

"Lucky for her, staff weapons weren't designed with accuracy in mind," Daniel Jackson interrupted. Teal'c raised an eyebrow at him and Doctor Jackson flushed guiltily. "Present company's staff weapon excepted of course," he said lamely.

"Still," Daniel continued, "we have no idea how she got there. She's wearing Earth clothes. Not to mention, the people on that planet were primarily of Middle-Eastern descent. Our guest is far too pale to be one of them, even without her obviously Earth-specific clothing."

"What about you Major Carter?" the short-sleeved General queried. "Any ideas?"

Carter sighed. "Plenty Sir," she admitted, "but unfortunately they've all come up blank. I thought maybe there might be a third 'gate on Earth that we're not aware of, since the kid clearly isn't dressed for the antarctic. So I had Walter do a radar and satellite search for any other sort of gate activity anywhere, but he drew a blank. And I doubt the Asgard have been randomly using transport beams to drop people on the other side of the Galaxy. Honestly? I'm stumped."

###

Half a galaxy away, in a dungeon on P3X-529, a slender wild-haired man stiffened in shock and then glared in helpless rage at the elaborately robed person on the other side of the cell bars which trapped him. The robed person smirked and spoke again, eyes flashing gold, his voice seeming to echo on its own.

"Come now, Doctor" he said in a mock-sincere tone. "Your young friend is dead because of your foolishness. My Jaffa killed her just before she reached the Chaapa'ai. Give me the knowledge that I seek and perhaps you can stop anyone else from joining her."

The man addressed as 'Doctor' made no reply. With his back pressed against the wall he slid to the floor of the cell. He gazed up at the creature with defiant eyes until it tired of him and left, promising to return with 'encouragement' for him to speak. As soon as he was sure of the creature's abscence, the man curled his arms around his knees, lowered his head and began to weep.

###

_The tunnel was dark and cold. In the distance she could hear the shouts of those who were hunting for them. Her companion's grip on her arm was painfully tight as he rushed her forward through the small tunnel. Clothes and hair caught on jagged edges of rock, tearing viciously. Mud from the tunnel floor coated her shoes. _

_A small explosion hit behind them. She turned her head towards her companion in concern when the grip on her arm lessened and saw his face twisted in pain. Then his expression became resolute as he drew his favourite tool from his pocket._

_"I'm going to create a distraction for our implacable friends back there. Keep going and don't wait for me. Once they're busy I'll leave through the second passage and go for the Tardis. I'll catch up with you at the 'Gate_

_"What?"_

_"Go. Now. Get back to the 'gate and wait for me there. If I don't turn up with the Tardis in an hour, then press the symbols I showed you and step through. Now go!"_

_"What? No way. I'm not leaving you here!"_

_"Yes you are. Those soldiers are catching up and we can't let the Goa'uld have control of the device. Now get out of here. That's an order!"_

_He pushed her onwards towards the pinpoint of light at the end of the tunnel. She ran, breath tearing at her throat. A bigger explosion sounded behind her. Sharp rock fell from the tunnel walls and she screamed as it tore the flesh of her arm. She hit the ground in a roll, dodging the rock falling everywhere. Dust rose up, blinding her._

_When the dust cleared she looked around. The tunnel had collapsed behind her, with her companion on the other side. There was no way to go back. Pushing herself off the ground, she staggered out into the light. She saw the 'gate on the horizon. Exhaustion seemed to pile upon her as blood continued to drip down her injured arm. Shots of laser blasts and gunfire echoed in the distance._

###

In the SGC's infirmary, the occupant of one of the beds jerked awake, tears streaming down her face, her jaw clenched painfully in an unconcious attempt not to scream. Briefly confused at waking up in a strange place, she raised herself on her elbows and looked curiously around for a moment before a stabbing pain in her right arm caused her to collapse back onto the pillows.

The quiet noise was enough to attract the attention of Janet Fraiser, who looked up from her desk and realised her patient was awake. Walking over to the girl, she smiled down at her. "Hello" she said gently,"how are you feeling now?"

The girl looked up at her but said nothing. Doctor Fraiser sat next to the bed and took the girl's hand. "We can't help you if you don't talk to us." she tried. The teenager gave no response, turning her head away from the doctor and pulling her hand free.

"You don't have to be afraid," Fraiser tried again, "if it's the Goa'uld you're worried about, you can tell us. We'll protect you."

When there was still no response from the girl, Janet thought of something she'd missed. "You are back on Earth, you know" she reassured her patient, "just talk to us. I'm sure we can find your family. You must have them worried."

Janet felt a moment's relief when the girl swung her head around sharply at the mention of Earth. She saw something close to worry, or perhaps guilt, flash across the teenager's face as quick as lightning. Then the generalized irritated scowl that the girl seemed to habitually display was back in place. Said scowl was immediately aimed at the unflattering hospital gown the girl had been given to wear after her stained, torn clothes had been dumped into the nearest laundry basket Janet could find.

The doctor chuckled in amusement at her patient's apparent disdain for the garment she was wearing. Summoning one of her subordinates, Janet sent the woman off with instructions to find serviceable clothes for the girl. She arrived back some time later with several pairs of plain BDUs in blue and green. The girl occupying the bed gave a cursory glance at the clothes and then fixed Janet with an incredulous look which said plainly: You expect me to _wear_ these?

Doctor Fraiser smiled at the girl's indignant look. "General Hammond let me know while you were asleep that he wanted to speak with you as soon as possible. So unless you plan to be wearing just that hospital gown. . ." Janet trailed off, leaving the image hanging in the air, nodding to herself as the girl's scowl deepened and she pulled a green shirt and pants towards herself.

"Thought you'd feel that way," Fraiser muttered to herself under her breath as she pulled a curtain around the bed to give the girl privacy. An indignant snort sounded from the other side of the curtain and Janet realised the girl had heard her. She grinned to herself.

###

Back on the Goa'uld controlled planet a confident System Lord strode towards his dungeons accompanied by his First Prime and his best interrogation device.

"As soon as we have the information we need, tell the engineers to prepare our new weapon for some target practice," he instructed his most loyal Jaffa. "I think Earth will do nicely, don't you?" Smug satisfaction dripped from the System Lord's voice.

The First Prime bowed. "At once, My Lord." he intoned, relaying his God's instructions through the communicator on his wrist. Soon, he thought, the Taur'i would be crushed and the other System Lords would follow, along with the heretics who called themselves 'the Free Jaffa'. All beings in the galaxy would bow before the one true god and as First Prime to ruler of the galaxy he would be exalted above all others.

Upon entering the dungeon, the System Lord strode to the cell at the end where the latest prisoner was being kept. With the help of his mind probe the System Lord was confident that he could tear the knowledge he seeked from the alien's living brain. The fact that the process would cause the prisoner extreme pain was an added perk.

However, upon reaching the last cell in the block the System Lord was presented with a shock as he opened the cell doors. The cell was completely empty. Not a trace of the prisoner or his method of escape could be seen. The Doctor was gone.

Ba'al roared in fury.


	2. Furious Lords

A storm was raging over Ba'al's fortress on the planet Maltek. Rain lashed down, turning the already damp earth to sticky mud. The Jaffa patrolling the open courtyards within the palatial complex found it sticking to their boots and those sent out to search for the escaped prisoner were faring even worse. Trying to track him through the muddy earth of the surrounding countryside, the men in the various patrols found themselves repeatedly sinking knee deep in the nearly impassable muck. Needless to say, they were not having much luck in locating the object of their search.

The guards posted at the Chappa'ai were marginally better off, as the 'gate was set into a large stone platform and was thus a few feet above the soggy, marshy ground. These guards however, were the remains of the patrol that had failed to stop an injured human girl from escaping them back at the fortress and then failed again by letting a team of Taur'i abscond with her through the Chappa'ai. They were not in the best of spirits.

The Lord Ba'al had been very direct. _No one _was to be allowed through the Chappa'ai. The fact that the team who had rescued the girl had been SG-1 had just added to his already foul mood. If they failed him again, there would be dire consequences. Thus, the Jaffa stationed at the Chappa'ai were currently among the most efficient soldiers a System Lord could hope to find. Lord Ba'al had made it clear that any Jaffa he deemed inefficient would suffer an agonisingly painful death.

###

Back at his fortress, the System Lord had recovered from his fit of rage following the Doctor's escape and was engaged in the business of adjusting his plan so that it could not be foiled by the SGC teams or the Doctor. His focus was more directed towards SGC and the infuriating Col. O'Neill, but Ba'al was being careful to also take into account any damage the Doctor could cause. Though the man had given the impression of being a babbling idiot, Ba'al mused while taking a sip of wine, the way the Doctor had sabotaged the weapon that had been found by his Jaffa, indicated that the man was probably a gifted scientist.

Once upon a time, Ba'al would not have thought of any scientist, no matter how brilliant, as a threat. However, several encounters with one Major Samantha Carter had taught him the error of thinking that way. O'Neill's blond second-in-command was known throughout the galaxy as the first person to successfully blow up a sun. If the Doctor was in anyway as intelligent as her - as Ba'al suspected he was- then the two-hearted alien could conceivably cause a large amount of trouble. The sooner he was caught, interrogated and summarily shot, the happier Ba'al would be.

The System Lord wiped his forehead in irritation, idly injected himself with the antidote to counteract the poison in his wine and then shot the servant who'd brought it to him. Ba'al smiled slightly to himself as he watched the nearest Jaffa rush to remove the body. Really, he thought smugly, Anubis' plots were getting entirely too pedestrian these days. It was high time he was replaced by someone younger and more clearheaded. As it happened, Ba'al knew a perfect candidate for the position.

###

In his office under Cheyenne Mountain, General Hammond was also having a less-than-satisfactory day. So far today his most experienced team had been ambushed on a recon mission and after escaping said ambush, had brought an off-world civilian back to earth with them. Said civilian appeared, in point of fact, to be from Earth and not P3X-529. Her identity had yet to be ascertained and despite the USA that had featured prominently on her clothes, there was no guarantee that she was American. Also, she was not giving any explanation as to how she'd ended up halfway across the galaxy without the use of a stargate.

In fact, she completely refused to speak. Inquiries to Doctor Fraiser had confirmed that their guest certainly had the ability to speak but simply chose not to use it. And of course there was the delightful prospect (confirmed by SG-1) that Ba'al had a new super-weapon. Thinking about the whole situation was giving George Hammond a migraine.

The only bright spot in the whole mess was the rumour picked up by SG-1 on P3X-529. Apparently Ba'al was having problems getting his new toy to work properly. That at least gave Hammond and his people some time to figure out exactly what the weapon was, what it did, how to destroy it and once again see that annoyingly suave and urbane mask that Ba'al always wore crack a little from aggravation. (Hammond always treasured Col. O'Neill's descriptions.)

A knock on his door brought General Hammond back to the here and now. "Come in" he called, knowing it was Doctor Fraiser. "Any news doctor?" Hammond asked hopefully.

Fraiser shook her head. "A little Sir. She still won't speak a word. You'd think she'd be happy to be back on Earth, but she just glares at anyone who tries to talk to her. I know it doesn't look like it Sir, but I think she's terrified. If her body language were words she'd be screaming. I got the impression she really wanted to go back through the 'gate. If it wasn't for the Airmen outside the door with guns, I think she'd have already tried to get to it. Apart from that, well I found something interesting in the blood samples I managed to get."

"Oh?" the General inquired.

"Well," Fraiser began, "for a start, her white blood cells are. . . odd."

"Odd?" Hammond asked. "How exactly?"

"They're much larger than normal" Fraiser clarified. "In fact, her whole immune system is, well, supercharged. She's in incredibly good health."

Hammond narrowed his eyes. "Are you talking about genetic manipulation, Doctor Fraiser? Do we have another Nirrti on our hands?"

"I honestly don't know Sir," Janet admitted. "Like I said, it's odd. There's no sign of the kind of genetic tampering that Nirrti was engaged in. It's like her immune system just decided to evolve on it's own. No one on Earth should have an immune system this good. I thought perhaps it might be an effect of living on P3X-529, but when I asked Dr. Jackson he said none of SG-1 had noticed any spectacularly healthy people, so that can't be it. I just can't explain it Sir."

"Looks like the only one who can explain anything is that girl," Hammond said. "There has to be _somebody_ she'll talk to. Any ideas doctor?"

Fraiser nodded. "Actually yes, Sir. When SG-1 brought her through the 'gate I noticed she seemed least bothered by Dr. Jackson. Probably because he was the only one_ not_ heavily armed. Guns generally make people nervous. Col. O'Neill informed me that she fought against him when he yelled at her to get through the 'gate. Dr. Jackson was the one who brought her through into the gateroom. Daniel is. . . an idealistic person. That makes it easier for people to trust him. And of course, he's handsome and she's a teenage girl. She might talk to him."

Hammond nodded. "Thank you Doctor Fraiser. I'll ask Dr. Jackson to talk to our guest."

###

On the hillside overlooking Ba'al's fortress, an enraged man was avoiding Jaffa patrols. Any other time, he would have considered avoiding heavily armed soldiers who wanted to kill him as a fun diversion. At the moment however, his mind was in far too much pain to be whimsical. He was angry, angry at Ba'al, angry at himself, angry at his friend for dying.

A small scouting craft flew over his head, bringing the Doctor out of his reverie. He knew he couldn't stay where he was much longer or he'd be found. He did not intend to let that happen. Not until he had a foolproof plan to make that parasitic snake pay for killing his friend. The Doctor's rule of 'No Second Chances' had momentarily gone out the window. The grieving Time Lord didn't plan to give Ba'al the luxury of a first chance.

Though he disapproved of violence, and was occasionally horrified at the propensity his favourite species demonstrated for it, a tiny primitive part of the Doctor's brain was relishing the fact that it had taken the Stargate Program developed in America less than 10 years to fully destroy the Goa'uld. If the Tok'ra had got off their backsides and_ done something_ sometime in the last _thousand_ years, then none of this might've happened. So many enslaved by the Goa'uld would still be alive. She would've still been alive.

Standing on that hillside, with it's spectacular view of Ba'al's palace, the Last of the Time Lords prepared to exact vengeance.

###

In the main lab at his palace on Mal'tek, the System Lord Ba'al was seething. The repairs to the Ancient weapon he'd recovered on the backwater planet in the next solar system were not progressing well. Ba'al had some of the most brilliant scientists among the Goa'uld working for him and he himself was no slouch when it came to technological knowledge, but the damage the Doctor had done to the weapon when he'd got his hands on it was beyond Ba'al's ability to understand, never mind repair. The same was true for his scientists, who were currently trying to make themselves as unobtrusive and inoffensive as possible, lest the rage steaming off their master be focused on them.

"So, what you are telling me, _your God_," he hissed, suddenly focusing on a luckless scientist who swallowed convulsively and then backed against the wall, "is that you, the greatest scientific minds in this system, cannot repair the damage done to this weapon, which was designed and built by the Ancients and stayed in perfect condition for thousands of years, by a humanoid who is _not even in his forties!"_

The scientist who was the focus of Ba'al's wrath whimpered, having horrible visions of a drastically decreased life-expectancy.

"Yes, my Lord," he squeaked. "The sabotage," he rushed on quickly, desperate to give Ba'al a reason not to have the Jaffa use him for target practice, "it's like nothing I've ever seen, my Lord. The Doctor used some kind of concentrated sonic burst. It shattered one of the crystal arrays. And that's just for starters! There's a whole host of other problems. Not ever the Taur'i woman Carter could have done this kind of damage, although some of her work comes close."

Ba'al nodded in thought, calming slightly and looking more like his normal suave self, then gazed piercingly at the scientist. "Then you're telling me that, you are, in fact, of no use to me?" he questioned in a silken tone.

The words _'therefore I have no reason to let you live' _hung in the air unsaid, and the scientist shook his head desperately as the System Lord raised a hand, the ruby crystal of the Qa'tek nestled in his palm. "No!" he cried desperately, "if I could just question the Doctor, I could repair the damage easily! I swear it! I just need a starting point. Please!"

Ba'al nodded graciously. "Very well, I shall give you another chance." The System Lord dropped his hand and turned to his First Prime who was standing in the doorway. "Double the patrols" he ordered. "I want the Doctor found and brought to me by dawn!"

The First Prime bowed, hurrying away to give orders and Ba'al turned back to the scientist, who was bowing and murmuring his thanks. Ba'al smiled benevolently and then raised his hand, hitting the man directly in the head with an energy wave from his Qa'tek. As the scientist screamed and thrashed in agony, Ba'al turned to address the other scientists.

"I am losing patience," he said softly. "Once the Doctor is brought here and interrogated, I want _results_. Otherwise you will not be as fortunate as your colleague here. Understood?" Jerking his hand, he released the screaming man from the grip of the Qa'tek. The scientist collapsed, sobbing in agony. Ba'al gave his colleagues a significant look. "Fail me again and your lives will be forfeit. Get back to work."

With that, the System Lord swept out the lab door, followed by his guards. As he headed through the corridors to his throne room, the Goa'uld sighed inwardly with wistfulness. _Just once,_ he thought, _it would be nice to be able to kill the scientists on a whim just like Jaffa, as the other System Lords do._

However, unlike other Goa'uld, who had a tendency to destroy everything that displeased them in a fit of pique, Ba'al was aware that while Jaffa were plentiful and easily replaceable, talented scientists were in short supply. Killing them on spot for trivial reasons might be fun, but it was also wasteful. And Ba'al was anything but.

###

Hundreds of feet under Cheyenne Mountain, Daniel Jackson paused at the door to the infirmary, trying his best to figure out a way to communicate with the room's sole occupant. So far, all attempts had failed, with the girl simply refusing to speak to anyone, or even acknowledge their existence. He honestly didn't know why the General and Dr. Fraiser thought that he'd have better luck. It wasn't as if his talents as a linguist were needed. They already knew that the teen understood English.

"Still," Daniel muttered to himself, "I guess it can't hurt to try."

Stepping inside the infirmary, Daniel spotted his objective immediately. Now dressed in one of the plain green uniforms SG teams wore around the base, she was huddled on a bed in the corner of the room, with her arms wrapped around her knees. Hearing him enter the room, the girl glanced up briefly before resuming her original position.

"Uh, hi there," Daniel said awkwardly, "d'you mind if I sit with you?"

She shrugged.

"My name's Daniel," the archaeologist tried, "you wanna chat?"

No response.

"I'm not a soldier, you know, I'm just an archaeologist. I've, uh, I've got a doctorate. Doctor Jackson, that's me. Like Doctor Fraiser. Well, not really, she's got a medical doctorate. But, y'know we're both doctors, just of different sciences, oh. . . are you okay?"

Daniel stopped babbling abruptly when the girl sitting next to him began to shake and sob. She was quiet at first, but her crying increased in severity and volume, tears streaming down her face. Acting on instinct, Daniel pulled the girl into a hug.

"It's okay," he said gently, "you're safe here, it's okay, shh."

To Daniel's surprise the brown-haired girl relaxed slightly, the tension that had been evident since she came through the 'gate fading a little. She continued to cry, her face pressed against his shoulder, tears staining his jacket.

"Hey," he tried again, "you're safe here, you're alright. The Goa'uld can't hurt you here. Why don't you tell me what happened okay? We can help you, you just have to let us."

The girl continued sobbing against his shoulder, but her crying diminished slightly and she murmured something unintelligible. Daniel blinked. _Okay_ he thought, _I'm not sure, but I think I heard the words 'kill me' and 'my fault' in there somewhere. How could this kid think getting shot at by Jaffa is her fault? Unless she believes the Goa'uld are gods. But somehow I doubt that. _

Eventually the girl stopped crying and pulled out of the hug. Resuming her original position, she stared at her knees, but Daniel could see her body language was different now. Before she had not looked at anyone because she was disinterested in anything they had to say. Now, she was not just looking at her knees for lack of a better option. She was avoiding looking at Daniel.

_Oh_, he realised,_ she's embarrased._

The girl swallowed suddenly, in the manner of one who's just made a difficult decision. Then she looked Jackson straight in the eye.

"You said you could help me," she said, her voice hoarse from crying, tinged with an accent that seemed familiar, but that Daniel couldn't quite identify.

"Yes," he assured her, "just tell me your name. What you were doing on that planet? How did you get there? Why were the Jaffa after you?"

The girl shrank back apprehensively at the sudden onslaught of questions and Daniel mentally cursed his over-enthusiastic tongue. To his relief, she straightened up after a moment and nodded at him.

"My name is Sam Sullivan. I need to go back through the 'gate. I have to save the Doctor."


	3. Kyprac's Bad Day

Kyprac, First Prime of Ba'al, was having a very bad day. Charged by his God with interrogating the two strange visitors, who had arrived in the oddest craft Kyprac had ever seen, he had not only not succeeded in wresting answers from them, but had also failed to stop them from escaping their cell within minutes. Twice, in the case of the tall, skinny one who _would not be quiet_. As such, Ba'al was not pleased with him.

Well aware that if he'd been the First Prime of any other Goa'uld, he'd be nothing more than a smoking pair of boots by now, Kyprac had redoubled his efforts to recapture the Doctor (again). Currently Kyprac was personally leading a Jaffa patrol towards an area where one of the scout ships had detected sonic interference. Kyprac guessed that this meant that the Doctor was somewhere in the immediate area and he planned to drag the wretched worm back to his God personally.

Lord Ba'al might tolerate one or two failures from a subordinate who was usually successful, but the God was currently in a steaming rage over all the damage the Doctor had done to the ancient weapon. Kyprac judged that a third failure at this time would not be forgiven. More likely it would earn him a one way trip to the dungeons and a chance to get to know his master's favourite 'devices' intimately.

Kyprac shuddered. Just once, as a newly trained Jaffa, he had dared to speak out of turn to his superiors. He had thought that the punishment he'd recieved then had been bad. Then one of his 'chastisers' had pointed to the next cell, showing him the pitiful remains of a Jaffa who had dared to fail the God. The sickening sight of a once proud warrior, lying in his own filth because it hurt too much to move, had given Kyprac more nightmares than anything else he'd ever seen. It had been a constant reminder that failure could not be an option.

Indeed, in the old days, Kyprac would have been dead by now, even as a Jaffa sworn to Ba'al, who was generally more forgiving than most Gods. But these were not the old days. The Taur'i had rediscovered the Chappa'ai. The first team they'd ever sent through it had easily defeated Ra, formerly the most powerful Goa'uld in the Galaxy. The great Sun God, who had made thousands quake with fear at the mention of his name, was now nothing more than irradiated bite-sized chunks floating somewhere in space, due to a Taur'i-made nuclear explosive compliments of one Col. Jack O'Neill.

Previously, the Jaffa race, as the emissaries of their Gods, had bestrode the galaxy like a colossus. Never faltering, never failing, they had conquered vast empires for their masters. Failure of any kind, defeat by anyone else except a brother Jaffa sworn to the service of an opposing god was not only unthinkable, but inconcievable.

And then Ra had been destroyed and two years later Stargate Command's first offworld team had stepped through the gate on their first mission. Since then, the System Lords had had to become accustomed to occasional failures, especially when the Taur'i were involved and especially when the name of the SG team contained that aggravating prime number.

SG-1! Three Taur'i humans and one Jaffa traitor, a former First Prime who had dared not only to fail his god, but to actively fight against him. Thinking of it now, it seemed impossible to Kyprac that four people had achieved so much. The Tok'Ra had been fighting the Goa'uld for thousands of years and had far superior technology, but SG-1 had stepped through the Chappa'ai armed with three earth projectile weapons and one staff weapon and System Lord after System Lord had fallen.

Sometimes, in his more despairing moments, Kyprac had thought that the Taur'i of SG-1 could not be humans. After all, how many times had it been reported that Dr. Daniel Jackson, the man responsible for the Taur'i discovering how to activate a Chappa'ai and unleashing the plague of Taur'i upon the System Lords, was dead. Ten, eleven? Kyprac wasn't sure anymore.

The human had had some kind of academic job, hadn't he? Some sort of teacher. And now he was known across the Galaxy as the man who could be killed, but bloody well wouldn't stay that way. Kyprac had seen Dr. Jackson several times. He had seen a dangerous and knowledgeable warrior, firing his weapon with deadly accuracy while simultaneously translating ancient writings. Daniel Jackson had _not _looked like some pacifistic teacher and researcher. More like death on two legs. Kyprac knew that he wasn't alone in cursing Apophis for taking the man's wife as a host for his mate.

And then there was Major Samantha Carter. No Jaffa had taken her seriously at first. As a woman, her place was clearly in the home, washing dishes and having children. The fact that the Taur'i let women play at being soldiers was taken as proof of their weakness. It was a view that had been held by many Jaffa who had been the first to encounter the then-Captain Carter. It was not a view they held any longer. Mostly because Sam Carter had proved to be an excellent shot with a gun as well as an unwholesomely gifted scientist. _After all,_ Kyprac thought,_ it's pretty hard to hold any views when you've just had a bullet introduced to your brain. Not to mention the fact that she blew up a sun._

Then of course, there was Teal'c. The shol'va. The traitor. One of the deadliest Jaffa warriors ever to live, with more skill with a staff weapon than many Jaffa ever achieved. Once First Prime of Apophis, now a member of the greatest threat to Goa'uldkind ever seen. Not to mention the fact that the treachery of he and his teacher Bra'tac had encouraged other Jaffa to declare open rebellion against their Gods. Never in thousands of years, since the first Jaffa had been born at Dakara, had such a thing happened. The Free Jaffa nation. Even the name nauseated Kyprac. He was free! Free to serve his God, just as he should, just as it had been ordained since the creation of the original First Primes at Dakara.

Thinking about the Shol'va led Kyprac to consider the man who had been instrumental in Teal'c's betrayal of Apophis. Colonel Jack O'Neill. The leader of SG-1. A human male in late middle-age, O'Neill was a trained warrior and a skilled pilot, showing his skill by successfully piloting anything that could fly, be it Taur'i aircraft or stolen Jaffa ships.

The man was also a cunning warrior, responsible for many plans that had the System Lords screaming their collective heads off. He had even impressed the alien Asgard so much that they named a ship after him. It was said that they even thought O'Neill to be an advancemant on the human evolutionary scale as he had an unusually strong strand of Ancient DNA present in his genes.

_And yet, _Kyprac mused,_ when I encounter him, he seems nothing more than a wise-cracking fool, too stupid to realise that he has insulted Gods and unable to work any technology more sophisticated than his . . . P-90 rifle, I believe they call it. And he is the one the System Lords would most like to see dead with his head on a spike._

_###_

Kyprac took a breath, trying to clear thoughts of SG-1 from his head. For all that they'd been the ones to rescue the Doctor's companion from capture, they were not an issue at this time. His objective now was to find the Doctor and make sure the skinny annoyance learned that it was extremely unwise to cross his God.

By now Kyprac and his squad had reached their intended destination. They were on a hillside overlooking the palace that Ba'al used as a headquarters when he stayed on Mal'tek. The trees were thick here, and as it was late in the day, an eerie darkness was settling over the forest. Ba'al's First Prime held up a hand and signalled to his men to fan out and run a co-ordinated search. The squad of Jaffa nodded silently in assent and melted noiselessly into the forest.

Kyprac himself remained at the location where the sonic signal had been picked up. Glancing around warily, he noticed something silver glittering in the bushes. When he went to investigate it, the Jaffa found that it was a slim silver tube. _Doubtless it is the device with which the Doctor damaged my Lord's weapon,_ he thought.

The big warrior bent to retrieve the device, figuring that the Doctor must have dropped it when fleeing the scout ship. When he straightened back up, Kyprac found himself staring into a pair of eyes full of barely concealed rage and pain. A skinny, filth-covered humanoid was inches from his face.

"That's my sonic screwdriver you've got there," the filthy apparition said manically, snatching the object out of his hand. "Ta for finding it! I'm the Doctor, by the way." Then it smiled viciously, baring bright, white, teeth in a feral grin. "What's _your _name?"

Before Kyprac could open his mouth to order his target's surrender, two long fingers pressed against a certain point on his neck. He collapsed, unconcious.

The Doctor grinned at the unconcious Jaffa, examining his armour and tattoo. He whistled triumphantly. "Ba'al's First Prime eh?" he said to himself happily. "Now we're cooking with gas!"

###

Deep under Cheyenne mountain, General George Hammond of Stargate Command was looking forward to at last getting some answers from the SGC's unusual guest. Doctor Fraiser had dropped by his office moments ago to inform him that her idea of sending Dr. Jackson to talk to the frightened girl had paid off well. In fact she was apparently talking so much now that Jackson was having trouble keeping up.

Hammond had thanked Fraiser for the good news and then asked her to meet with the girl and the rest of SG-1 in the briefing room in one hour. Now he sat at his desk, going over paperwork and making notes as he waited for the hour to pass so that he could finally get some answers as to what was going on and send a satisfactory report to the IOA so that they'd leave him alone. The higher-ups there had been calling constantly since it had been reported that someone who was possibly an earth civilian had ended up halfway across the galaxy.

General Hammond sighed into his paperwork. He suspected there would be a visit from Richard Woolsey very soon and he was not looking forward to it. He knew that really, Woolsey was a good man deep down, but the bespectacled man was a little too worried for the safety of his own job over the security of the damn planet. Still, the general had to allow that Woolsey had improved a lot since he'd first met him.

The truth of the matter was that the IOA wanted the girl questioned by one of their people and moved to a secure location 'for her own safety.' Because the SGC _had_ been infiltrated before, and they were only thinking of the young lady's well-being of_ course._ Hammond snorted softly to himself. The IOA had gotten a _lot_ more involved after they'd got the preliminary report on SG-1's mission which had included Dr. Fraiser's medical data on the girl. But of _course,_ they hadn't suddenly began insisting on taking custody of the girl simply due to the fact that she apparently had an immune system superior to that of the entire planet.

_And if you believe that George, _Hammond thought to himself,_ then the weather channel has some things to report that you may find interesting, such as red moons, aeriel pigs and the lowest recorded temperature in hell. _

Hammond sighed again. Why was nothing ever simple? He looked at the clock. Half an hour to go.

###

It was the middle of the night on Mal'tek now. Wind and rain lashed on the mountain side, tearing branches off trees and turning the ground to an increasingly muddy mess. Through it all, the Doctor continued on as the wind and rain stung his face, determination and the hot desire for vengeance and justice driving him onward.

Right now all of his emotions were doing battle in the Time Lord's mind. The savage primitive part of his brain was telling him that Ba'al needed to die in order to be defeated, that he deserved it for the thousands of lives he'd destroyed. That he deserved it for taking _Sam's_ life.

Logic pointed out that Ba'al hadn't pulled the trigger.

Vengeance snarled that staff weapons didn't have triggers, and the Jaffa had served Ba'al so that made the slimy System Lord ultimately responsible and deserving of having the symbiote cut out of his head with a spoon. A very blunt spoon.

Logic informed vengeance that all spoons were blunt.

Compassion spoke, insisting that he couldn't do that, it would kill Ba'al's host who was innocent.

Vengeance, backed up by Rage and Pain snarled that it didn't care.

Shame and Compassion quietly pointed out that _Sam _would've cared.

Vengeance cooled down slightly, but Pain jumped back into the fight by declaring that Sam was _gone._ He'd never see her smile again, never be able to show her beautiful things, never be able to teach her about all the different things she asked about.

She'd never ask him things again. He'd never find her curled up in the Tardis library with one of her impossibly silly science fiction books. She'd never hug him after a bad day and say _"I'm glad you were there_" or watch a triple sunset with him and declare _"I love travelling with you."_

He'd never have to chase off unsuitable males by glaring at them and informing them that _"by the way I'm the Last Time Lord and that girl you're making eyes at is my niece."_

He'd never get to hear her scold him for lying or laugh and ask him if he'd consulted with her uncle before indulging in identity theft.

Pain roared that _Sam is gone and it hurts! I want to make the Goa'uld feel this pain!_

Conscience awoke and asked what Sam would think if she saw him kill someone because of anger. And if he didn't count the opinions of the dead, then what about Rose, Martha and Donna, what about Jack and the Brig, what about Sarah Jane, what about Harry? What would they think?

Vengeance roared that Harry had loved Sam as if she was his own daughter. He'd be right behind the Doctor with a knife.

Shame pointed out that Harry would probably shove that knife in the Doctor's back. He deserved it. He had promised Harry that Sam would be safe.

Conscience told him that as the last of the Time Lords he had a duty to uphold. Defeat Ba'al if he must, but find a way to do it without killing him. Sam would want him to. After that he had to find Sam and bring her home to Earth.

Vengeance demanded to know how he'd ever look Harry or Sam's brothers in the face after bringing home her body. How could he tell them that the one responsible still lived?

Conscience snapped that neither uncle nor brothers lived in a country practicing the death penalty. They would understand. Or they would kill him instead.

Shame pointed out that ultimately it was his fault anyway. If anyone deserved to die it was him.

Logic said the whole debate was pointless anyway until he was face to face with Ba'al. He still had work to do.

Determination said it was time to get moving and ended the debate.

###

A messenger brought the news to Ba'al as dawn broke. All the Jaffa patrols in the area where the Doctor had last been spotted had ended up unconscious. Even the one led by his First Prime. Some reported the Doctor himself had knocked them out using some sort of bizarre martial arts technique. Others reported being hit by a bright flash, like an expanding forcefield.

All the patrols had one thing in common. Their staff weapons had been completely disabled, turned into smoking bits of slag. An investigation of the shattered weapons revealed something else. The power cells had been removed before further damage was inflicted.

It meant that Doctor was carrying at least twenty power cells with him. Which meant he had the equivalent of about 40 kilos of high grade Earth explosives on his person.

Ba'al realised the stress was getting to him when he accidentally strangled the messenger using his qa'tek. He had only meant to hurt the man, not kill him. Clearly something would have to be done.

Ten minutes later reinforcement troops were on their way from the next planet.


	4. Explanation

The door to the briefing room opened and the people already seated at the table looked up expectantly. The focus of their attention was the teenage girl peeking at them from behind the SGC's most experienced resident archaeologist. She noticed all eyes were on her and shrank back slightly before working up her nerve, standing as tall as she could and giving everyone seated a 'what're you looking at?' glare.

"So," Col. O'Neill questioned, "you gonna talk to us now kid?"

The girl nodded and took the seat that Daniel had pulled out for her with a quiet "thanks". He smiled at her and she went red. O'Neill sighed inwardly. _Yet another girl joins Danny's fanclub,_ he thought. _How come I didn't get that lucky when I was his age. I had a uniform and everything. _Pulling himself out of his slouch, he saluted as General Hammond entered the room behind Daniel and the kid. The rest of SG-1 and Dr. Fraiser were already seated.

The General sat down and then nodded to Dr. Jackson to begin. Daniel cleared his throat and made a last second attempt to tidy the briefing papers in his manila folder. As always, this attempt was unsuccessful. Daniel dropped the Folder of Doom back on the table and silently swore to defeat it next time.

"Uh, okay," he began, and then turned to the girl and introduced everyone to her by name and rank. That done, Daniel turned back to the room at large.

"Everyone, this is Sam Sullivan. She's a, um . . . traveller. She and her friend 'the Doctor' happened to be, uh, passing through P3X-529, when they heard about Ba'al's discovery of the Ancient weapon. According to Ms. Sullivan here, the Doctor decided to destroy it before Ba'al could use it, but things went a little wrong for them and they got separated. The Doctor was supposed to meet with Sam at the stargate, but given his non-appearance, it's probable that he's been, ah, captured by Ba'al."

Sam rolled her eyes at this. "He's not dead," she said in an irritated tone, glaring at Daniel.

"I never said he was," Dr. Jackson said defensively.

"But you think he is. You think that just because the big bad System Lord has thousands of elite warriors at his disposal and technologically advanced weapons, that he's killed the Doctor. Rubbish. He probably needs rescuing, but dead? No way. Besides, Ba'al needs him alive."

"Uh, well. . . " Daniel floundered, a bit taken aback.

Carter decided to rescue him. "You and your friend were passing through on your way to somewhere else, and you just decided to take on Ba'al?" she asked.

"Yes."

"And you say you're not agents of any other System Lord, or an independant human government?" Carter queried, a bit disbelievingly.

Sam snorted. "I wouldn't be caught dead helping those parasitic slugs! As for a human government? Us? Work? For wages? Not in a million years. And I _really_ mean that."

"So," Hammond stated. "You and your friend are just . . . travellers. Who arbitrarily decided to inconvenience a System Lord."

She shrugged. "Yup."

"Wait a minute," O'Neill interjected. "Why would tall, dark and horribly over-dramatic need your friend alive?"

The teenager turned to look at him, a satisfied smile on her face. "Because no one else can fix his new toy," she said smugly. "And while I'm answering all the questions here, could someone tell me something?"

"Uh, sure," Daniel told her. "What would you like to know?"

"Exactly how long have you Yanks been using the stargate?"

"That's classified," the General said flatly, before Daniel could answer. "And I take it from your slang that you _are_ from Earth."

"Never said I wasn't. You've single-handedly made your country solely responsible for the safety of the entire world. Don't you think that's a bit arrogant?" Sam asked, looking extremely irritated by the idea.

"The Stargate Program is run by the American Air Force under the auspices of the UN. That's all I'm going to say on the matter," Hammond declared.

"Bet it was up and running before the UN found out though, wasn't it?"

Hammond glared.

Sam raised her hands in a gesture of surrender. "Okay, okay, I get it. No asking about classified stuff. Sor_-ry_."

"If you _are_ from Earth," the General said, "then how did you get to P3X-529?"

Sam grinned. "Sorry, that's classified."

Hammond glared again, this time at his subordinates, who were Definitely Not Laughing. "You asked for our help, Ms. Sullivan," he reminded her. "You know, you could be held for-"

"For what?" she demanded, interrupting him. "Last time I checked, leaving the planet wasn't illegal. And you can't exactly prosecute me for illegally entering the country, not when it was _your_ guys here who dragged me through the 'gate against my will."

"You'd rather we left you there to be shot?" Jack said sarcastically.

"Uh, well no, but-"

"Then quit complaining, kid," he snapped. "We're trying to help. But we need info. OK?"

Sam fell silent for a minute, focusing on the gray-haired man. She cocked her head to one side, narrowing her eyes suspiciously. "Who did you say he was again?" she asked Daniel.

"Colonel Jack O'Neill," the archaeologist said.

"With two l's," O'Neill clarified.

The SGC members looked on with interest as the teen's eyes widened and she muttered something to herself in an unfamiliar language. Jack looked to Daniel.

"Translation please?" he requested.

Daniel suddenly found he had all eyes on him. He shrugged helplessly. "I can't," he admitted. "It's familiar, but I can't place it. It did sound similar to the language used by Camulus' subjects though. Possibly an offshoot of the Celtic languages. Dialects from remote districts are difficult to translate, you kn-"

There was a loud _thwack_ and Dr. Jackson stopped in alarm as Sam smacked her head against the table in mock-aggravation.

"Remote dialect?" she asked the air in the tone of one who has been personally offended. "Thank you so very much, oh great and knowledgeable linguist! It _happens_ to be a language still spoken every day!" She broke off and thought for a second. "Although, you could definitely call Conamara remote. Whole place is like the back of a bog."

"Oh. . ." said Daniel as realisation dawned. "Apologies," he said, "I recognise it now. Your accent threw me off a bit."

"Yeah, well," she muttered, slightly mollified. "S'pose it's not your fault. You probably thought Tom Cruise did a good effort in Far and Away, I suppose."

"Actually," Daniel said, grimacing, "I couldn't believe I paid ten dollars to have my eardrums assaulted."

Sam laughed as the rest of the room stared at them both. Daniel coloured and cleared his throat again.

"Sam's Irish," he explained. "She was speaking in modern Gaelic. I really should have recognised it faster."

###

Ba'al was pacing in his throne room restlessly and only the fact that it was completely beneath his dignity as an all-powerful god was keeping him from chewing nervously on his lip. The reinforcements had arrived and despite the fact that the only new patrols who had encountered the Doctor had ended up in the same situation as the old ones, they had brought him some new information. But it was information that had shocked and frightened the confident System Lord.

_Tell that parasitic snake he should run. Because I'm coming for him. You got that? You tell him there's a storm coming._

That was what the last patrol had brought back. A warning from the Doctor, whispered to the leader of the patrol before the humanoid alien had knocked him out again. When the patrol had reported back, Ba'al had felt a chill down his spine. Most of him hadn't wanted to give any credence to the old, half-remembered legend about Sutehk's demise. But a small part of his mind kept saying _'what if? What if it's really true? We would never have even left our planet, never mind created an empire if the Ancients had not built the stargates. And even they were said to hesitate in His presence. What if the Doctor really is Him? I told him the girl was dead! Have I angered the Destroyer of Worlds? The Oncoming Storm?_

Ba'al grabbed a goblet of wine from the nearest slave and downed the whole cupful in one gulp, in an effort to relax. The stress was getting to him, he realised. He needed to calm himself. His iron self-control was slipping and that was not acceptable. Dismissing his guards and servants, the System Lord took a few minutes to get his breathing under control and rationalised that the Doctor had not called himself the Storm, he had merely given a vaguely portentous warning. It was an intimidation tactic, nothing else.

Just as Ba'al's stress began to dissipate back to it's former level, a loud boom reverberated throughout the palace and the valley it was in. Seconds later, Jaffa warriors rushed through the throne room doors to inform their God that the Jaffa outpost nearest to the palace had exploded. Running to a window in the hallway outside, Ba'al saw fire lighting up the sky.

_The Oncoming Storm. . . _

###

Teal'c, who had been silent until now raised an eyebrow at the teenaged girl. "You do not seem to have any relation to the representation of your nation in popular media," he said.

"And you don't seem much like other Jaffa I've met," she retorted. "They were falling all over themselves to worship a parasite."

"I have renounced the false gods and sworn to fight them on behalf of my people and the people of the Taur'i," Teal'c informed her.

"Good for you," Sam grinned. "Would you feel better if I wore a green hat and said 'Top o' the mornin' to ya, laddie' ?"

"That is not necessary."

General Hammond cleared his throat. "Now that we know where you're from Ms. Sullivan, would you like to tell us how you got to P3X-529?"

She shrugged. "Guess so. The Doctor brought me. It's actually called Mal'tek by the way."

"I'm guessing the Doctor is not human?" Carter asked.

"No," Sam admitted, "but he's not a bad guy either. He eats guys like Ba'al for breakfast. Keeps the Earth safe."

"Really?" Daniel asked interestedly. "Does he come here often? To study us or something?"

"Why does everyone find our brains so interesting?" O'Neill wondered aloud.

Sam burst out laughing and only laughed more as the SGC personnel stared at her. "Study our brains?" she choked between laughs. "You've got the wrong alien fellas. The Doctor is much more interested in studying the contents of the local chipper than human physiology."

"Chipper?" O'Neill said, confused.

"It's uh, European slang for a fast-food place Jack," Daniel explained.

"That's right," Sam said, calming down slightly. "The Doctor doesn't come to Earth to 'assess human potential' or stuff like that. He just likes it here. It's like his favourite holiday spot."

Dr. Fraiser, who like Teal'c, had remained silent untill now, spoke up. "So your advanced immune system is nothing to do with the Doctor?" she asked.

Sam stared at her. "My advanced _what?_"

"Your immune system," Fraiser repeated. "You remember I ran some tests to see if you were healthy?" Sam nodded. "Well, you have the most incredible immune system on the face of the Earth. Are you sure the Doctor had nothing to do with that? After all, even his name is-"

"Okay. Just stop." Sam snapped, interrupting the brunette doctor. "I don't know about your tests, but the Doctor would never, ever, ever, experiment on anyone. Ever. He is a good guy. Okay?"

Sceptical faces looked at her and in frustration she turned to Teal'c. "Hey, big guy, you're a Jaffa right? So you used to serve a Goa'uld?"

"Indeed," Teal'c said. "I was once the First Prime of Apophis."

"First Prime? And you told him where to stick it?" Sam said in surprise. "Wow. Go big guy."

Teal'c inclined his head in acknowledgement.

"But anyway," Sam said, "you must know a lot about the Goa'uld, and a lot about _their _beliefs, right?"

"I do have some amount of knowledge," the big Jaffa conceded.

"So," the teen continued, "what do the Goa'uld think of the Oncoming Storm?"

Minus Sam, the entire room stared as Teal'c's eyes widened, he went pale and his jaw dropped in shock. "He is just a legend!" the normally taciturn Jaffa exclaimed loudly.

"Nope," Sam said happily. "He's real. Right now he's back on Mal'tek with Ba'al. And I would really like to get out of this depressing concrete rat-warren and go help him." She leaned back in her chair and gulped down some water.

There was silence for a couple of minutes as the shaken Jaffa collected himself.

"Teal'c?" General Hammond asked warily, "could you explain please?"

"Of course, General Hammond," Teal'c said, still rather pale. He took a brief sip of his own water and then made an effort to straighten his already ramrod straight back. "The Oncoming Storm is a figure from not only ancient Jaffa legend, but a figure common to myths in many other cultures as well," he said. "It is said he is an ageless being, a shapeshifting wanderer who never stays in one place for long. It is also said he is the last of a dead race."

"Yeah," Sam muttered half to herself, "I wouldn't go saying that to his face if I were you, he's a bit touchy about that."

Teal'c raised an eyebrow at her.

"Uh, sorry. Please continue." she said, embarrassed.

Teal'c nodded. "In Jaffa legend," he declared, "the Oncoming Storm was the one who showed the first ever Shol'va the truth about the Goa'uld. That they were not gods. That they could and would die. It was the secret legend of the Jaffa people, passed down by those who realised that they served false gods but could not speak out lest their own brothers kill them. Master Bra'tac related the legend to me, only when he was sure that I no longer believed Apophis to be a god. The Oncoming Storm prophesied that one day the Jaffa would be free and serve no gods."

"Prophesied?" Sam muttered again. "Hah! That big show-off, he owes me twenty quid!" she said cryptically.

Teal'c stopped briefly to give the girl a severe look before taking another sip of water and continuing.

"The Oncoming Storm has many names, one for every culture that has myths about him. The common element in all stories of the Storm is that he is a force of good, bringing the guilty to justice, punishing the wicked and saving the innocent. He is a hero beyond reproach. If this Doctor is truly the Storm then I would be honoured to meet him. If not, I would still like to meet him."

"Why's that?" Carter asked curiously.

"So that I may punish him for misusing the name of one who is holy to the Jaffa people."

At this, Sam stood up and looked the big Jaffa in the eye. "The Doctor is the Oncoming Storm," she said in a quiet serious voice. "He is all you said and more. Everyone in the damn universe owes him their lives. And if you, or any of your friends ever, ever try to hurt him, then I will take you apart. Do you understand?"

Teal'c smiled. "It is also said that the Storm is always accompanied by loyal companions who are as brave and righteous as he is. They are usually female humanoids."

"Yeah, well, girls are smarter. Proven fact."

"Alright," General Hammond said. "I think we've established, at least for now, that the Doctor is one of the good guys. But Ms. Sullivan I can't let you go through the 'gate alone. You'd get killed and I won't have that on my conscience."

"But I have to go help the Doctor. Ba'al could be holding him prisoner right now. That weapon may be disabled, but it's not destroyed. And what part of 'everyone on Earth owes him their lives' did you not get? Let me go back and help him! I didn't ask your men to bring me here, and I'm not an American citizen so you can't bloody well keep me under arrest!"

"Actually I can," Hammond told her. "But that is not the issue here. You are not going back. Colonel, get your team ready."

"Sir?" O'Neill said, momentarily confused.

"I'm authorising a rescue mission Colonel," Hammond told him. "Your primary objective is rescuing the Doctor and returning to Earth as soon as possible, but if he can destroy Ba'al's new weapon then buy him time to do so."

"Yes Sir." O'Neill said, snapping off a salute.

"As for you Ms Sullivan-" Hammond began.

"I'm going too," Sam said firmly. Your men here all carry guns. The Doctor won't trust them, especially not when he sees a Jaffa. Uh, no offense big guy." she added.

"None taken Sam Sullivan," Teal'c replied.

"Besides, " Sam added before the General could protest, "I'll be able to camouflage myself better than these guys. Watch." And she took a small key on a chain out of her pocket an hung it round her neck. The collective members of the SGC blinked in surprise.

"Where did she go?" Janet Fraiser gasped.

"Uh Sam? Where are you?" Daniel asked.

The others in the room reacted similarly. Except for Jack O'Neill, who stared at _them _in amazement. The kid hadn't moved, she was standing right where she was and grinning. Then she noticed he was staring at her and waved.

"Wow," she said. "I guess Thor was right, you are advanced."

O'Neill blinked.

"You are the Col. O'Neill the Asgard named their big ship after, right?"

"Uh, yeah, that's me," O'Neill admitted. "How do you know Thor?"

Sam shrugged. "He and the Doctor are old friends."

"Jack?" Daniel asked in confusion. "Who are you talking to?"

"The kid!" Jack said. "She's right there, look!"

Sam grinned at him as Daniel stared without seeing her. "They can't see me. My key? It's a perception filter. No one notices me when I'm wearing it. 'Cept 'advanced' people like yourself." Then she took the key from around her neck and 'reappeared', giving the shocked doctor, General and the rest of SG-1 a quick explanation.

General Hammond nodded slowly.

"In that case, I suppose it's safe enough for you to go through the 'gate. SG-1, you have a go."

 


	5. Whoops! Time Traveller!

Sam stood in the observation room with General Hammond and the members of SG-1, watching as the little robot that Daniel had called a MALP went through the Stargate to ensure it was safe for a team to proceed. Master-Sergeant Walter Harriman sat at a monitor in front of them fiddling with controls and typing vaguely important looking things on his keyboard. As the monitor flickered and the MALP began to transmit from the other side of the gate, the SGC personnel blinked in collective surprise.

"Well, that's something you don't see everyday," Col. O'Neill drawled, squinting interestedly at the image of an entire Jaffa patrol lying motionless and disarmed in front of the stargate.

"Speak for yourself," Sam muttered. "Though, I'd've thought you guys would see a lot of weird stuff in your job."

"Yep," Jack said. "But Jaffa don't normally come pre-buttkicked."

"Ms. Sullivan?" the General asked. "Do you have any idea what could have done this?"

Sam hmm'd as she considered the General's question. "Depends. . . can your little robot thingy tell us if those Jaffa are alive?"

The General looked inquiringly at Master-Sergeant Harriman.

"Stable life-signs coming from all six of them Sir," the Stargate and MALP operator reported.

"In that case, the Doctor probably did it."

"How can you be sure of that?" Daniel wanted to know.

Sam shrugged. "I haven't had much experience with Jaffa, but I'm pretty sure anyone else mad enough and capable enough to attack them wouldn't've left them alive. Besides, the people on that planet think Ba'al's a god. Who _else_ could it have been?"

"Whoever took down six Jaffa would've had to use an awful lot of force,"Major Carter pointed out. "I thought you said the Doctor was non-violent."

"Mmm. . . usually," Sam said slowly. "Unless they did something to really piss him off. Sometimes he can be a bit, uh, vindictive, shall we say? It's not a good idea to push him too far. He can . . . react badly. Looks as if they're only unconscious though, so I don't think he had much of a problem with those Jaffa." Sam chewed distractedly on her lip. "They probably just tried to kill him or something," she added dismissively.

"Oh is _that_ all," Col. O'Neill said, privately hoping that the kid was exaggerating.

Sam crossed her eyes at him. "Yes _that's all, _Colonel Sarcasm. People try to kill the Doctor all the time. He doesn't take it personally. It's when the Evil Overlord of the Week attacks other people that he gets all twitchy."

"Of the _week_?" Carter asked in a perturbed tone. "Just how much trouble do you two get into?"

"Nothing we can't handle!" the teenager said defensively. "Now can we all stop jawing about it and go already? The longer we wait, the more trouble the Doctor's going to be in."

###

As he avoided the many Jaffa that were searching the burning outpost for him, the Doctor gave himself a mental thumbs up. It worked everytime : blow something up and the Big Cheese would send his toy soldiers out to investigate. The bigger the explosion, the more troops sent out, meaning even less protection for a certain parasitic life-form that was about to get some long overdue comeuppance.

The Jaffa outpost had been some type of temple built by the native humans of this planet and repurposed by Ba'al's Jaffa. It reminded the Doctor somewhat of a forum in ancient Rome. As such, it was, or rather had been, a large rather impressive stone building. Thanks to the Doctor's explosives, it was now a dangerous collapsing pile of masonry. Aware of this, the Jaffa patrols were searching slowly and cautiously, something that worked to the Doctor's advantage as he evaded them.

Noticing a patrol heading his way, the Doctor quickly ducked out of sight behind a crumbling wall. "Persistant fellows," he muttered to himself, peering carefully around the wall and watching the Jaffa patrol as they continued to search. _Gonna have to create a big distraction if I want to get out of here, _he thought. _Wouldn't want to be late for my meeting with Ba'al._

The Doctor pulled a box-like object from his pocket, crouched down in the shelter of the wall and then activated the small device. Seconds later an explosion occurred in another part of the outpost. The Jaffa that were closing in on the Doctor immediately took off, running towards the smoke and dust.

"Tcht," the Time Lord said to himself in amusement. "Abandoning their posts and running off towards a very obvious distraction. What substandard behaviour for soldiers. The Brigadier would be appalled." A cracking sound above him made the Doctor glance upwards to find that the roof was collapsing. "Time to get out of here," he decided. And with that, the last Time Lord ran down the corridor and out of the Jaffa outpost like his life depended on it.

It took the Doctor less than a second to realise that his rapid retreat had attracted the attention of the Jaffa who had been assigned to watch the building's exits. But, by then it was too late. A blast from some unknown energy weapon had already connected with back of his head.

###

O'Neill swore as he let loose another round of bullets. For the third time since they'd arrived on this planet, SG-1 and their teenage tag-along had been shot at by Jaffa. _So much for a quiet, in-and-out rescue mission, _he thought, ducking to avoid a blast from a staff weapon. _The whole place is crawling with Jaffa. Not even Ba'al's this paranoid. What the hell's going on?_

Bringing up his P-90, Jack finished off his attacker with a precise shot and then looked around to check on his team mates. Teal'c's assailant lay dead before him and a quick shout from Carter told him that she and Daniel had taken care of the rest of the patrol. Jack located a place reasonably out-of-sight and gave them the 'head over there' hand-signal before looking around for the kid. He blinked in surprise when he spotted her.

Sam was sitting comfortably half-way up a tree, her weird camouflage-key hanging around her neck. She waved enthusiastically at the Colonel and began to climb down from branch to branch, dropping the last few feet and landing on her hands and knees with a pained "ow."

Once they had all gathered behind the covering of trees and rocks that O'Neill had deemed safe, Daniel turned to the teenager. "Are you okay?" he asked, obviously worried about what effect seeing SG-1 take care of the Jaffa patrols would have on her.

She waved him off. "I'm fine, really. It's not pleasant, but compared to the cybermen, this is easy."

"Cybermen?" Major Carter asked.

"Yeah, you know, Cyberman invasion, the Battle of Canary Wharf, the ghost shifts?" Sam said. SG-1 stared at her blankly and her expression grew worried. "You don't know," she muttered to herself. "Oops."

"Invasion? In London?" Daniel questioned in some alarm. "When? Why didn't the SG-C hear about it?"

"London?" Teal'c asked, raising an eyebrow.

"That's where Canary Wharf is," Daniel informed the Jaffa warrior.

Sam waved a hand dismissively. "It's fine, it's taken care of. Don't worry about it."

O'Neill narrowed his eyes at her. "Hold it kid," he said, ignoring the automatic glare at the reference to her age. "Either you explain, or we drag you back through the 'gate. I knew there was something you hadn't told us and I'm not moving another inch until you explain."

Sam glared back at him. "I _can't_. If I do, we could be eaten by mutant-flying-monkeys from beyond the dawn of time. You wouldn't belive me anyway."

"Don't you mean before the dawn of time?" Carter said.

"No. Where they come from there is no time."

"And we are likely to attacked by these 'flying-mutant-monkeys' while we're on this planet?" the Colonel asked, irritation seeping into his tone.

"No!" Sam half-yelled back in frustration. "Not if you stop asking me paradox-causing questions!" She stopped, her eyes widening as she realised what she'd said. "Oh crap."

"Paradox-causing. . . ? You're a time-traveller!" Carter said accusingly. Her team-mates turned expectant gazes on the teenager.

Sam sighed, her shoulders slumping. "Busted. What year is it anyway? I thought it was. . .uh . . . my year. But apparently not, so. . .?"

"Wait a minute," Dr Jackson said interestedly. "You've seen our technology and you thought it was your era. So in the future, the technology we've found using the Stargate, it's in public use? Is the Stargate program common knowledge" he asked excitedly. "No wait, you asked the General how long we'd been running it, so it must not be. How far ahead are you from? A century? Less?"

"How was the technology introduced to the public?" Carter wanted to know, her eyes shining.

Sam held up her hands placatingly. "Whoa there. Slow down a bit." She looked at each of them in turn. "You guys seem to take time-travel as a fact so. . . Yes I'm from the future as far as I know. I won't know for sure by how much until somebody tells me the year. As for the other questions, I can't tell you future stuff in case-"

"Of paradoxes," Daniel finished apologetically. "Sorry, I should've known that. Got a bit excited."

"Me too," Carter said sheepishly. "And I'm supposed to be the one who's an expert in that stuff."

"Don't worry about it," Sam told them. "So," she said, looking at the colonel, "the year is. . . "

"2002," O'Neill supplied. "So what _are_ you and your friend the Doctor doing back in the good old 21st century. Was Ba'al gonna do something horrible with that weapon? Were you guys trying to change the past?"

Sam gave him an insulted look. "Do I look like a complete and total _moron_? Anyone who knows anything about time-travel knows that you never, ever mess with established events. It could cause a giant, universe ending paradox. What kind of _idiot_ do you think I am?" She stopped, noticing the awkward looks the members of SG-1 were giving each other. "Oh you _didn't!_"

"It was an accident!" O'Neill protested. "It was 1969, for crying out loud!"

"Oh," Sam said, momentarily forgetting her righteous indignation. "Good year. Did you guys see the moon landings?"

###

Waking up with a pounding head, the Doctor groaned in pain. _What the heck happened? _he wondered. Memory returned seconds later. _Oh right. I got shot. Again. Note to self: Remember that not all Ba'al's Jaffa are mindless twits. Some of them are smart enough to stay at their posts. _His head ached and he groaned again, looking 'round at his current accomodations. _Another prison cell. Oh joy. Ba'al really needs to have a talk with his decorator. This place smells foul._ He sniffed, wrinkling his nose. _No, wait, I smell foul. The cell is fine. Damn._


	6. Goa'uld Fashion

Dozing in his cell, the Doctor became aware that somebody was watching him. His eyes flicked open and found Ba'al standing outside the energy barrier. The System Lord was dressed immaculately, his black robe pristine and not a hair out of place. The Doctor sniffed the air briefly and caught the cloying scent of perfume. _Eurgh, _he thought. _Trust a Goa'uld to go all out when it comes to dressing up. How he can stand the smell of that stuff?_

The Doctor's thoughts on male grooming were interrupted as the System Lord leaned forward, a very self-satisfied smirk on his handsome face. "So _this_ is the pathetic lifeform claiming to be the legendary Oncoming Storm," Baal said, smugly contemptuous. "You don't look like much to me," he continued. "I'd expected the Destroyer of Worlds to look a lot more impressive." Yawning insultingly, Ba'al said, "really, I am most disappointed. You seem to be only a skinny half-breed human. _Most _disappointing."

"Yes, well, you know what they say," the Doctor retorted. "Appearances can be deceptive." Then a cheeky grin made its way onto his face and he sniffed in mock-disapproval. "You're not the only one who's disappointed mate. It's been nearly two thousand years since I destroyed Sutehk. I was kind of hoping the System Lords would have got that silly penchant for melodrama out of their, aha, systems, by now."

"Silence wo-" Ba'al attempted to say, but the Doctor was in full babble mode now and no mere order was going to shut him up.

"I mean, just look at you! You're a walking example of how _not _to behave if you want to be an Evil Overlord. Don't you know that foppish black robes are _so_ last millenium? No self respecting villian would be caught dead in that thing. I have to tell you, that outfit went out of style around about the time the Egyptians stopped using pyramids as resting places. You ought to invest in a suit and tie. No one'll take your attempt to conquer the universe seriously if they see you walking around in a dress. And another thing-"

"SILENCE!" Ba'al roared, finally losing his temper. "By Ra! I had not believed it possible, but you are even worse than that blasted Taur'i O'Neill! Shut your mouth dog, or I will remove your tongue! Know that you are only still alive so that you may repair the Ancient weapon for me, your new God. I suggest you keep in mind that you will still be able to perform this service for me even after I have certain extremities removed. But no doubt life would be easier for you if you were still in possession of your fingers? Hmm?"

"Oh please," the Doctor said sarcastically, "torture? Is that all you've got? Do you _honestly _think that I'll repair a weapon that could let you threaten billions of lives to save my own skin? Think again Ba'al. There is nothing you can do that will make me help you. _Nothing. Not anymore._"

Ba'al's eyes narrowed as he looked at the Doctor, surprised at the sudden rage in the man's tone. Then he realised the reason. "Oh. I see. You seek vengeance on me for that girl's death. That is foolish of you. I am a God. I cannot die. Your desire for revenge is meaningless. If you had not taken her with you when you fled, she would not have died. After all, I needed you alive to repair the weapon, but the girl was of no use. She wasn't even anywhere near beautiful enough for my new consort to use as a host. Pathetic."

As Ba'al finished speaking, an ancient instinct for survival warned him that he might've just made a very big mistake. The man in the cell had gone stock still, his entire body seemingly frozen. Then his head jerked up and he stared straight at the System Lord. Utter fury pooled in the Doctor's eyes and the simple unadulterated hatred in his expression made the System Lord unconsciously take a step back.

"Her name was Sam," the Doctor said slowly. "Not 'that girl'. Sam Sullivan. And no," he continued, "she wasn't beautiful and she had only slightly above average intelligence. She was clingy, overly sarcastic, rather arrogant, prone to self-pity and she could be quite nasty in a childish kind of way. But she tried. She _tried _to be better. She loved learning new things and seeing new places. She loved travelling with me! She _loved_ _me_ and it wasn't that unfortunate romantic worship that I occasionally inspire in people, not that I can help how wonderful I am, you understand. She loved me because we were _friends _and _I _loved _her_ like my own daughter! And you _took that away!_"

By now the Doctor's voice had lowered almost to a whisper as he snarled at Ba'al in hatred. The System Lord stood there, unwillingly transfixed by the voice and eyes of the Lord of Time as he let forth a flood of pain and rage.

"No second chances," the Doctor choked out, emotion closing up his throat. "You've seen your last sunrise Ba'al. She wouldn't have wanted me to do it, would have insisted in saving you along with your host. But she's gone. I'll never see her again and it's _your fault. _She was a _child,_ seventeen years old with her entire life ahead and _you murdered her. _As a Time Lord I cannot interfere with established events or fixed points in history. But your death isn't one of them. _So I have no problem making it happen a little earlier!_"

Abruptly the Doctor dropped his gaze and Ba'al found he could look away from the eyes of the skinny, filth covered man in the torn clothes. Ba'al stood there, breathing in pained gasps, his heart hammering beneath his ribs. He opened his mouth to give a suitably contemptuous reply, but nothing came. For a moment Ba'al's mouth worked soundlessly and then he gave up and strode away as fast as he could without looking as if he wanted to run for his life.

As soon as he was sure the System Lord was out of earshot, the Doctor once again sank to the floor of the cell and wept, his enraged sobbing the only sound in the oppresive silence of the dungeon.

###

At that precise moment, SG-1 and their teenage tag-along were hiking through some rather dense undergrowth.

"So," Daniel said carefully to the girl as he ducked his head to avoid being blinded by some of Mal'tek's more dangerous vegetation, "exactly how far ahead are you from? Are you allowed to tell us?"

"What?" Sam replied, momentarily distracted by difficult brambles. "Oh, uh yeah. 2009."

Daniel blinked. "Two thousand and _nine?_" he said.

"Uh huh," Sam said, idly brushing a briar out of the way.

"Two thousand and _nine_." Daniel repeated in a flat voice.

"Yup. Is something wrong?" Sam asked, frowning at the handsome archaeologist.

Daniel sighed. "No. I guess not. I was just kinda hoping that. . ."

"Yes?"

"Nevermind."

The rest of SG-1 had turned to stare in surprise at Sam and she shrugged, giving them all a look that said '_what?'_

"The Doctor's the one with time travelling capabilities then?" Carter confirmed and the teenager nodded.

"'Course. I'm just along for the ride. There's not much difference between 2002 and 2009. Heck, Henry Hayes is still the US president. We certainly don't have time travel available to highest paying customer or anything." Sam snapped her mouth shut with a grimace. "Whoops. Uh, promise you won't try to make money on that?"

"Well. . ." O'Neill drawled, "I dunno. . ."

"Oh c'mon! The Doctor's gonna be pissed at me otherwise! Please don't say anything!"

O'Neill grinned at her and Sam realised he'd been joking. She gave him a dirty look. "Jerk," the girl muttered. "Can't understand why Thor thinks you're so great."

"Must be my dashing good looks," the Colonel replied.

Sam snorted. Behind them, Carter rolled her eyes, her lips twitching in an effort not to grin. "Hey, Sam?" she asked, catching the girl's attention before the teenager could start sulking.

"Yeah?"

"What kind of ship does the Doctor have?" Carter asked. "I'm assuming he does have a ship. You two don't just time travel by thinking the right year, right?"

"No, the Doc's got a ship," Sam confirmed. "She doesn't look like a ship though, see, the Tardis, that's his ship, she has a chameleon circuit so that she disguises herself and blends in with the local scenery when she lands."

"That is good," Teal'c intoned seriously. "If it is disguised, then it will be much harder for Ba'al to find. No doubt he would jump at the chance to attain technology that could be used to travel in time."

Sam's face developed a sheepish cast and she coughed uncomfortably. "Uhh. . .well, actually. . .the Tardis's chameleon circuit is sort of broken. She's um, stuck in one form."

"Stuck?" O'Neill asked. "What as?"

"Perhaps a 1985 DeLorean, O'Neill?" Teal'c suggested.

Sam's jaw dropped and she stared at Teal'c in shock. "You, you. . . you have a sense of humour!" she said accusingly.

"Indeed."

Sam scowled at him, feeling as if she'd been tricked and walked away, muttering to herself in Irish.

"Daniel? Translation please?" O'Neill requested.

"She thinks we're all big jerks and we should all go . . . um, shave cheese?" the linguist replied.

"Why do I think the last bit is Not Right?"

"Give me a break Jack," Daniel protested. "She's speaking very fast and the last time I spoke Irish was right after I finished learning it. That was nearly fifteen years ago. Besides the Goa'uld that use the Celtic Languages use the archaic versions and Samantha is speaking in modern Gaelic. There's a pretty big difference."

There was a brief silence as the five humans continued trudging onwards through the dense vegetation. Eventually Sam sighed. "Sorry," she apologised to the team. "That was pretty immature of me."

"Don't worry about it kid," O'Neill said, waving his hand vaguely to indicate that all was forgiven. "So what does this Tardis look like?"

"Well. . . if you must know, she looks like a blue phone box."

There was another brief silence.

"A nineteen-sixties police public call box to be precise," Sam said helpfully.

O'Neill favoured the girl with a long slow look. "You fly around time and space in a. . . phonebox," he said disbelievingly. "Doesn't it get a mite. . . cramped?"

Sam shook her head. "Nope. See, the Tardis is dimensionally trans, transcend-" Sam gave up. "She's bigger on the inside."

"Oh! Dimensionally transcendental, Sir," Carter explained.

"What she said."

"Quiet!" O'Neill hissed suddenly. "Jaffa patrol, three o' clock. Teal'c, Carter, concentrate on their front. Daniel, you protect the kid. Kid, put on the invisi-key again and get out of sight."

Everyone rushed to obey.


	7. History Lesson

Skilled as they were and with the element of surprise on their side, SG-1 had little trouble quickly dispatching the Jaffa patrol. Once O'Neill gave the all-clear signal, Sam emerged from her hiding place behind a wide-trunked tree with Daniel hovering near her protectively, his weapon at the ready.

"So, Sam," Dr. Jackson began, feeling he should make an effort to distract the seventeen-year-old from the recent killing, "you and Teal'c said the Doctor was a member of an ancient powerful race, right?"

"Yep."

"Well," Daniel continued, "they, uh, wouldn't happen to be the Furlings, would they? See, the Ancients had an alliance with four other races. We've met the Nox and the Asgard, but we've never managed to come across the Furlings so I was wondering if they might be the Doctor's race?"

The girl shook her head sharply. "Nope, the Doctor's Gallifreyan."

Daniel's brow wrinkled in thought. "I don't think I've ever come across that name in Earth's mythologies," he said.

"Uh, yeah, there's a reason for that. Gallifreyans and Alterans do not mix. He certainly didn't approve of them and the Asgard setting themselves up as Gods and mythical figures here on Earth. I know the Asgard did it with the best of intentions, but if the Alterans hadn't done it in the first place, the idea might never have occurred to the Goa'uld. We like Thor though, so the Doctor gets on okay with the Asgard. But the _politest_ thing the Doctor's ever said about your 'Ancients' is that they were a load of neglectful, self-righteous twits with an over inflated opinion of their own genius. He wouldn't go near them with a ten foot pole."

O'Neill snorted with laughter. "I could get to like this guy."

Daniel gave him a pained look, feeling vaguely insulted. "Jack," he protested, "the Ancients were the gate builders. Without them we wouldn't be out here. Besides, they were the first sentient species to develop on Earth. We owe them a bit of respect."

"Tell that to the Silurians," Sam muttered under her breath. Teal'c shot her a quizzical look, but she shook her head. "Forget it."

"I wouldn't argue with the Doctor about the Alterans," she told Daniel seriously as the team got moving again. "All you'll get is a speech on how very wrong you are and believe me, if there's one thing the Doctor does well, it's talk. I once saw him defeat an evil warlord by doing nothing but talk at the guy for three days straight.

Daniel blinked. "That's a . . . novel approach, but I doubt it would work on Ba'al."

"Yes, well, anyway I wouldn't argue with the Doctor if I were you. You're already at a disadvantage, seeing as you're an archaeologist."

"Excuse me?" Daniel demanded in a surprised tone.

"He's a time traveller," the teen explained. "He points and laughs at archaeologists."

"How nice for him," Daniel muttered, now feeling extremely insulted.

"The Doctor's scared of librarians though," Sam laughed, "there was this time in um. . . Boulder, Colorado I think. Anyway, we ran into this one library 'cos of the rain and the librarian there figured out the Doctor had been there before and she started scolding him like he was a little kid. Turns out he had quite the fine built up. Owed like a thousand dollars or something." The teen smiled. "I liked her."

Daniel grinned, feeling mollified, and his natural curiosity reasserted itself.

"So," he asked, "could you tell me about the Gallifreyans? Do they have _any _connection to the Ancients at all?"

"Nope," Sam told him. "They were a completely different species." She paused and looked at the archaeologist. "Maybe you could clear something up for me?"

"Uh, sure, no problem," he agreed.

"Every time you run into another human culture on a planet you get to by Stargate, it has a counterpart culture on earth, right?"

"Yeah, that's pretty accurate," Daniel replied, unsure of where the brown-haired girl was going with this line of reasoning.

"Well," Sam explained. "Gallifreyans were _not_ human. They were a separate species that evolved on their own planet in a different galaxy and there was never a Stargate erected on Gallifrey. I think the Alterans tried once and the Time Lords went nuts. Hence the mutual dislike."

"So the Gallifreyans. . ." Daniel began thoughtfully.

"Are completely separate from all of this," Sam said, finishing his sentence. "They had nothing to do with the Alterans, Earth, the stargates, the Goa'uld, or the Alliance of Four Races."

"Danny, I know this is all fascinating to you, but at least try to keep an eye on your surroundings," O'Neill said, suddenly coming up behind the two conversants and startling them. "We're the Fifth Race, by the way," he added.

"Are we?" Sam said with some surprise. "Cool. Good for us."

"Yep," O'Neill said. "We have _potential, _and apparently our brains are very interesting."

"Now you sound like Thor," Sam accused.

"Well, I was paraphrasing him," O'Neill admitted. "How do you know so much about this stuff anyway?" he said suspiciously.

Sam shrugged again. It seemed to be a habit of hers, O'Neill noticed. "A couple of months ago, the Doctor and I met Thor and helped him out with something," she told him. "That was the first time I saw a Stargate, so I asked the Doctor about it." Sam paused and winced in remembrance. "Of course, once motor-mouth was finished talking I'd been given a complete rundown of the history of the Alterans, the stargates, the Asgard and the whole Alliance of Four Races."

Daniel gaped at her with undisguised envy. "Could you. . ?" he began.

"Paradoxes," she reminded him.

"Damn."

###

As the SG team and their teenage accomplice continued onwards, Sam noticed that the big Jaffa warrior, Teal'c, would occasionally throw curious glances in her direction. That is to say, his eyes would flick towards her for a fraction of a second before returning to survey the landscape in front of them for possible threats. At first she made an effort to ignore it, but as they continued onwards and the big man's eyes kept flicking towards her, she grew irritated.

Finally, she stomped over to the big man, stood in front of him and pointedly said "What?"

Teal'c raised a well sculpted eyebrow in surprise. "I do not understand what you mean, Samantha Sullivan," he said.

"It's just Sam," she snapped at him. "Like Major Carter. Now, why do you keep staring at me?"

For a second she thought he wouldn't answer, but then the mask of blank indifference that he seemed to habitually wear dropped from his face and his expression developed an unexpected intensity.

"You travel with the Oncoming Storm," Teal'c stated, the last two words said with somewhat frightening reverence.

"Uh, yeah. So?"

"Why?"

Sam stared at Teal'c, a little afraid of the imposing figure he made. "Because he asked me if I wanted to and I said yes. That's usually the way it works."

"No," Teal'c corrected her mistake. "Why you?"

_"Oh,"_ Sam said, realising what the Jaffa was getting at. "You wanna know why the Oncoming Storm would voluntarily saddle himself with a pain-in-the-ass like me."

"That is. . . not how I would describe you," Teal'c said, a shade awkwardly.

The girl grinned at him. "No? It's certainly how _I_ describe me. But I get your point. The Doctor is like some kind of myth or holy figure to you, am I right?"

"Indeed."

"Well, he's also a guy who travels the universe for the fun of it. But that gets lonely after a while. When I ran into him, the Doctor didn't have anyone with him. So once he'd seen that I could handle myself against carnivorous aliens and evil university professors, he invited me to come along."

"Ah," Teal'c said as realisation dawned. "You proved your courage and were rewarded."

Sam smiled sadly. "That's one way of putting it. There's also the fact that my parents died a couple of years ago. Due to a number of factors which I won't go into right now, the Doctor feels that he is ultimately responsible for it. So I'm also pretty sure he likes having me around so that he can see to it personally that the same thing doesn't happen to me." _He also has a guilt complex the size of a planet and is in dire need of a good therapist,_ she thought,_ but you guys don't need to know that._

"I'm sorry," Daniel said, understanding clear in his voice.

Sam shrugged philosophically. "Don't be. You didn't kill them. My brother put a hedge-trimmer through the metal bastard that did."

There was a brief silence from the human members of SG-1 as they absorbed this information. Teal'c however, nodded approvingly.

"So, the Doctor wasn't the ultimate cause of your parents' death's?" the Major Carter asked in a neutral tone.

Sam favoured her with a look that suggested she thought Carter was out of her mind. "Don't be bloody stupid," she snapped.

Teal'c turned towards Sam, seemingly mulling something over. "The Doctor," he said carefully, "is he truly the last of his kind?"

The expression on the teenager's face was one of obscure pain as she answered him. "Yes," she said sadly. "The Gallifreyans, also known as the Time Lords, by the way, were probably the most powerful race in the universe. Back about a zillion years ago they discovered time travel and pretty much perfected it, giving themselves dominion over time itself. But their society, as far as I know, was one of total peace. They really weren't prepared for war. And the Daleks lived for nothing else."

"The Daleks?" Carter asked.

"The ancient enemy of the Time Lords," Sam explained. "Their planet was called Skaro and the inhabitants consisted of two humanoid races called the Thals and the Kaleds. They'd been busily wiping each other out with radioactive weapons for, oh, nigh on a thousand years." Sam paused briefly and her expression darkened. When she spoke again there was utter hatred and disgust in her voice. "And then Davros came along."

"Davros was a Kaled scientist," Sam continued. "He was obsessed with genetic engineering and racial purity. To be perfectly honest, the bloody maniac would've gotten along well with one Adolf Hitler. Anyway, he designed an armour casing that would protect someone from the high levels of radiation that were practically everywhere on Skaro. Called it a mark 2 travel device, I think. Then he genetically engineered his Daleks and popped each one them inside an armour of their own. That was the day the most ruthless, murderous race in the universe was born."

"Are they really so terrible?" Carter asked a little doubtfully.

"They wiped out the Thals in less than twenty-four hours," Sam said flatly. "A war that had been at a stalemate for over a century was ended in a single night." She turned her head to look Carter in the eye. "And when I say wiped out, I mean exactly that. Every single Thal was wiped from the face of Skaro. All of them. And then they decided to start on the rest of the universe."

"Ah, the old universal domination card," O'Neill said, attempting to lighten the atmosphere. His attempt failed miserably in the wake of Sam's next sentence.

"No," she replied. "Universal extermination. Daleks don't conquer, they destroy. If they do conquer it's because it'll help them destroy a species faster." Looking at the doubtful faces around her, Sam stopped and heaved a sigh. "You're not getting it. Davros was obsessed with genius, survival, racial purity and superiority. And that's what he bred into his Daleks. Every single one of them was smarter than Einstein and they all believe that they are the pinnacle of evolution. They have an unspeakable hatred for every living thing in the universe that isn't a Dalek. They have no emotion but hate. They have no love, no compassion and certainly no mercy. If you come across one it will kill you instantly because you are not a Dalek and for that, it honestly believes you deserve to die."

"How could anyone create something like that?" Daniel asked her in an appalled tone.

The teenager shrugged. "I did say Davros was crazy. We're talking about a guy who was once asked that if he happened to discover something that would kill everyone else in the universe in a single second, would he use it? His answer was a rather loud and emphatic Yes."

Daniel shuddered.

"I take it that the Daleks declared war on the Time Lords?" O'Neill asked.

"Yes," Sam replied. "They went to war. I don't know very many details, because the Doctor doesn't like to talk about it, but I know it was terrible. The Daleks and the Time lords didn't just fight across space, they fought across _time_ as well. The universe very nearly came apart at the seams. Eventually, sheer numbers began to overwhelm the Time lords. To put it simply, they were losing."

Sam paused, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. "Once the Time Lords realised this, they came up with a plan to destroy the Daleks by sacrificing themselves so that the other races in the universe would survive. The inferno they set off didn't just destroy the Dalek fleet. It burned Gallifrey to a cinder."

"The Doctor was the only survivor," Teal'c stated.

"Yes."

"_Damn_," O'Neill breathed. "We _owe_ this guy."

"More than you know," Sam told him.

"Eh?"

"Even before the war, Daleks had been turning up in other places. Like Earth. There was a very short invasion of Britain by the Daleks in oh. . . sometime during the eighties. One Dalek could depopulate a fair chunk of Earth. The only reason we weren't wiped out back then was because of the Doctor. He saved us. But it's more than that. The Doctor loves Earth. I mean he _really _loves it. Even before Gallifrey was destroyed he spent most of his time on Earth. After the war, he sort of adopted it as a temporary home."

"So why does he like it so much?" O'Neill asked, interrupting Sam's small speech.

"Honestly, I couldn't tell you for sure," the girl admitted. "I think it's because it's the first alien planet he ever visited. Over the years he's made a lot of friends on Earth. In a way, we're like children to him. Sometimes he describes us as god awfully stupid and amazingly inspiring in the same sentence. We're kinda his favourite species and he likes to help us out. Trust me, without the Doctor, the human race would've been extinct ages ago."

"We can look after ourselves too, he knows that right?" O'Neill asked, his eyes narrowing.

"Oh yes," Sam assured him. "The Doctor only gets involved when something starts threatening the course of history. Like, there was this time in 1579 when some Karandish warriors tried to murder Queen Elizabeth and use Britain to take over the rest of the world. We stopped them obviously, but if we hadn't, history would've been irreversably altered."

"You actually _saw _Elizabeth the First?" Daniel asked, his eyes shining.

"Hah, _saw,_ he says," Sam muttered to herself, staring at her feet. Then she looked up and scowled. "The bloody woman wanted my head cut off! And the Doctor's too of course," she conceded. "But mostly mine!"

"Why? What did you do?" Major Carter asked curiously.

Sam scowled again. "Alright," she admitted grudgingly,"I _may_ have commented on the fact that she needed to bathe more than four times a year. Loudly. In front of the entire court."

"Ah," O'Neill said, nodding sagely. "Probably not a good idea."

"Gee, ya think?"

"Cynical, aren't you?"

"You see a lot of things time travelling," Sam said flatly. "Mostly you see how stupid, greedy, power-hungry people tend to repeat the mistakes of the past. Sometimes I think humans are only special because they are murderous, tenacious bastards and if you screw with them they will rain down fury upon their attackers that other species literally cannot conceive of. But that's just my personal opinion, which, by the way, I don't tend to mention in front of the Doctor because it depresses him."

It was during the shocked silence following this statement that SG-1 and Sam became aware that two Jaffa patrols had snuck up and surrounded them.

 


	8. Reunion

Colonel Jack O'Neill and his team had, over the last couple of years, ended up as prisoners of a Jaffa patrol more than a few times. Mostly it was unpleasant, usually it was painful and occasionally it involved unconciousness. This time, Jack thought, was just downright _weird_.

As usual, they had been disarmed and instructed to walk one behind the other. Also as usual, they had staff weapons pointed at their heads and they had also been given the obligatory 'now you will bow before pick-random-Goa'uld' speech. That was all pretty standard. No, what was weird about this particular walk of doom was the tag-a-long teen being completely ignored by the Jaffa while she amused herself by making obscene gestures.

The instant the Jaffa had surrounded them, the teenager that Jack unconciously thought of as Sam Junior (Sam Senior of course being Carter, not that he'd ever get to call her anything other than last name and rank, _damn_ regulations,) had dropped to the ground and stuck her perculiar invisi-key-thing around her neck.

From the cries of shock that the Jaffa had let slip when this happened, Jack was aware that he was still the only one who could see through the Key of Invisibility. He'd been exceptionally relieved that the kid had had the foresight to roll away from where she lay before the Jaffa recovered from their surprise and shot at the grass where she'd been. There had been a few near misses as the Jaffa resorted to shooting around the area randomly in an effort to find her, but Sam had managed avoid both the stray shots and discovery. To the Jaffa patrol, it had been as if she'd vanished into thin air.

So now, as SG-1 were escorted towards Ba'al's fortress by the Jaffa patrol, Jack was hard pressed to keep from smirking as he watched Sam, who was currently walking next to him, stick out her tongue at the patrol leader before resuming the quiet monologue that only he could hear.

"Guess they'll probably lock you guys in a cell for a while before Ba'al comes up with a suitably dramatic way to kill you," Junior was saying, "you know what he's like. Smartest, most non-melodramatic of the System Lords, and yet he _still_ thinks that stupid black vampire-cloak thing is _haute couture._"

O'Neill nodded surreptitiously, trying not to grin and therefore draw attention to the fact that he was listening to his invisible friend. The kid had warned him that everyone else _could_ in fact see her, but that the perception filter encouraged them not to pay attention to that fact. However, if he acted as if she was there, then the Jaffa would unconsciously shrug off the effects of the invisi-key in an effort to work out who he was talking to.

"Anyway," the teen continued, "once it's all clear, I'll get you guys out, 'kay? And then we can go rescue the Doctor, blow up the weapon and throw mud at Mr. I'm-So-Godly-In-My-Perfectly-Black-Robe. That'll annoy him for sure. Goa'uld might have pretty advanced weapons, but I've yet to see anything that indicates they've discovered dry-cleaning."

Jack hastily bit his lip to keep from snickering.

###

The Doctor groaned quietly. He hadn't shown it during his little talk with Ba'al, but his head was still aching from the blow of the staff weapon. As he massaged the back of his head with his hand, the Time Lord took stock of his current situation. Yes, he was in a cell inside Ba'al's stronghold, but if you left out the 'in a cell' part, the fact remained that he had successfully entered the System Lord's main base. That part of the plan could be labelled a success.

There was also the fact that, due to a combination of sleight of hand and pockets that were bigger on the inside, he still had quite a bit of explosive material in his posession, despite the best efforts of the Jaffa who'd searched him. The box marked 'secondary objective completed' could therefore be ticked off.

Unfortunately for the Doctor, that brought him straight back to square one. He was in a cell. With no sonic screwdriver, since that _had_ been confiscated. Which meant, that for the moment, his big plan had literally hit a brick wall. And it was not a brick wall that he could blow down with the copious amounts of explosives that he had hidden in his pants, since given the design of the cell, using the type of explosive currently available to him would only cause said wall to collapse inwards, thereby crushing the Doctor to death.

"Which means I am temporarily stuck until they come to drag me out of here to repair that weapon," he muttered to himself. "Craters."

###

As he leaned back on his throne, Ba'al allowed himself to relax slightly. He now had the Doctor back in his power and whatever plan the skinny man had come up with was now irrelevant. As an added bonus, his First Prime Kyprac had just contacted him to report the capture of SG-1. The knowledge that his Jaffa were holding the infuriating Taur'i O'Neill and his subordinates at gunpoint gave Ba'al a little warm glow of satisfaction.

Apparently the Doctor's companion had returned to Mal'tek along with SG-1, but had disappeared when O'Neill and his underlings had been captured. As he considered this, Ba'al decided it didn't matter. The girl hadn't been carrying a weapon and given the Doctor's description of her, was unlikely to be a troublesome gifted scientist or a warrior. A patrol would find her soon enough and then she could be used as leverage to make the Doctor to repair the Ancient weapon.

As he waited for the patrol to escort SG-1 into his presence Ba'al idly drew up a mental list of what he might do with them and came to the conclusion that he would enjoy sending recognisable body parts to the other System Lords who had repeatedly failed to stop SG-1 thwarting their plans. Their irritation at Ba'al's success was bound to be enjoyable.

Except for O'Neill's head, Ba'al decided firmly. That particular item would be preserved and mounted on the wall of his throne room as an interesting conversation piece.

Satisfied with his decision, Ba'al sighed and settled back on his throne contentedly. Once SG-1 was out of the way, he would be that much closer to replacing Anubis as the undisputed ruler of the galaxy. Life was good.

###

Sam swore loudly for several minutes, using every profanity she'd heard on earth as well as a few alien ones she'd managed to pick up when the Doctor was out of earshot. From the strained look on Col. O'Neill's face, she could tell that he thought she was about to give herself away, but she was too furious right now to reassure him that mere volume wouldn't nullify the perception filter's ability.

"That stupid, overconfident, skinny, show off, _jackass!_" Sam yelled. "He's done it _again!_ Why the hell do I hang around with someone who has absolutely _no_ sense of self-preservation! Ooh! Just wait 'till I catch up to him! I'll use his guts for garters!"

They'd eventually arrived at Ba'al's fortress and were being escorted to the cells when a middle-rank Jaffa had passed them, going the other way. Sam's blasphemous outburst had been triggered by the sight of the Jaffa tossing the sonic screwdriver in his hand.

"You know what this means?" she continued in a snarl, apparently addressing the air around her from what Jack could see. "That _moron_ has got himself captured _and_ he doesn't have his screwdriver with him. Just -ing brilliant! If Ba'al's given him _one_ scratch I am going to kick System Lord ass! Right after I kick the Doctor's for getting captured in the first place. Why does one of us _have_ to end up in a jail cell every time we go somewhere new? Aargh! That dumbass!"

_Kids, _O'Neill thought, both relieved and intrigued that Junior's little outburst hadn't blown her cover. Though her language was atrocious and her words were harsh, it painfully obvious to someone as skilled at reading people as Jack that her entire monologue of profanity could be replaced with the words: 'thank god, my friend is alive, I was so worried.'

Eventually, after cursing solidly for another three minutes, Sam fell silent. O'Neill was pretty sure that it was only because she'd run out of swearwords. He'd begun keeping count, and was pretty sure she'd cycled through at least five languages, maybe more, and not all human. Jack wasn't sure he ever wanted to know what a _clavach-kree-pelkassic _was. He was just glad he didn't have one.

By now the Jaffa and their prisoners had reached the cells. Blue light from the energy barriers flickered, casting eerie shadows in the dark corridor. Halting in front of a particular cell, the First Prime a entered a combination on the keypad, bringing down the barrier for a few moments as SG-1 were unceremoniously shoved to the floor of the cell.

The First Prime turned to face them as the barrier lit back up. "Your fate is now in the hands of Lord Ba'al. Pray worms, that he will be merciful and give you a quick death."

"Well sure," O'Neill snarked back in his most sarcastic tone, "anything to get away from your bad dialogue. Seriously, who writes your lines? Even the scriptwriters of Wormhole X-treme couldn't come up with that crap."

To the surprise of the cell's occupants, a bitter laugh echoed from what they'd thought was a pile of rags in the dark corner of the cell. "Ba'al," it said in what Daniel distantly recognised as a London accent. "Didn't you know? 'I must come up with painfully clichéd and trite threats for my Jaffa to say to prisoners' is in the Goa'uld handbook, right after 'Conquer the universe' and 'Kill innocent people'."

As the Jaffa patrol turned and marched back up the corridor, their footstep dying away in the distance, Sam mouthed 'screwdriver' at Jack and followed them, waving her hand in a 'back soon' gesture.

The members of SG-1 turned to look at the man hunched in the corner of the cell, hidden beneath a ragged mud-stained suit. As he got to his feet and walked into the light, the team were confronted with a slender framed man with wide, dark eyes and spiky brown hair.

"So. . ." the man said thoughtfully, drawing out the word to three times it's usual length. "By the looks of you lot, you're an SGC team." He turned and squinted at the gold symbol embedded in Teal'c's forehead. "First Prime of Apophis. . . which makes the four of you. . . SG-1." He swung around suddenly, staring Jack in the face. "Am I right. . . Colonel . . . O'Neill?"

"Possibly," Jack conceded. "And it's O'Neill with two l's. There's a Colonel O'Neil with one l over in communications. He has no sense of humour."

The bedraggled man laughed at Jack's statement, but it was tinged with a worrying edge of insanity. "Pleased to meet you O'Neill with two l's. You should leave as soon as you can. I don't care what you came here for, whatever it is, it doesn't matter. It's not worth losing your life for."

"We can handle Ba'al," the Colonel assured the wild eyed man. "Maybe we can help you out."

Another bout of hoarse bitter laughter issued from the prisoner. "You? Help _me _out? No offense, but I doubt it. Not unless you can ressurect the dead. No, you just concentrate on getting out of here. Let me deal with that, that, _snake._"

O'Neill's eyes narrowed dangerously, so Daniel quickly stepped in, fearing a sudden explosion from his friend and teammate. "Well then, maybe you can help us," he said diplomatically. "Have you seen any other prisoners recently? We're looking for someone called the Doctor."

At Daniel's words, the man stiffened. "Now why would you want to look him up?" He grinned ferally, madness and pain in his eyes. "The Doctor's a dangerous man to be around. People who get to know him tend to die. You lot still have a lot of work to do. You don't want to get mixed up with him."

"Perhaps so," Teal'c said, moving forward to talk, "but we must find him. You know his location, do you not?"

The man nodded, the grin washing from his face, replaced by intense loathing and sadness. "Oh yes, I know where the Oncoming Storm is. Ol' Ka-Faraq-Gatri, the Lonely God, the Destroyer of Worlds. You absolutely sure you want to get involved with him? Those titles aren't for show, you know."

"Wow, you sure seem to dislike the guy," Carter said.

"Major Carter," the man responded, his eyes full of despairing anger, "you have _no _idea."

As O'Neill listened to the conversation, he became aware of light footsteps heading towards them. Glancing at the others, he saw that they hadn't noticed. Not even Teal'c, which was very unusual. Maybe that meant it was Junior?

Sure enough, seconds later Sam appeared on the other side of the energy barrier, a silver tool in hand. She waved cheerfully at O'Neill and then froze suddenly, her eyes wide with shock, transfixed by the sight of the man sharing the cell with SG-1. Abruptly she pointed the silver tool at the keypad and pressed down hard. A piercing, buzzing noise filled the air briefly and then the keypad exploded, the energy barrier disappearing almost simultaneously.

"You look like you've been dragged through a hedge backwards!" she snapped at the filth covered man, pulling off her perception altering key. "What the hell happened to you?"

###

The Doctor was halfway through telling the attractive blonde Major a whole list of reasons why SG-1 should not get involved with him when the barrier went down. When the apparition of Sam appeared in the doorway, he choked in shock. _I've finally gone totally insane, _he thought. _Oh well, I didn't like sanity all that much. Besides,_ he thought as tears slid down his face at the impossible hallucination of a healthy very-alive Sam haranguing him about the state of his clothes, _insanity seems to have it's perks._

"And another thing!" the impossible apparition continued, "I had to pick the pocket of a Jaffa to get your screwdriver back. I can't believe you actually let them take your screwdriver!" The ghost pulled on it's ponytail in aggravation. "God," it said, "sometimes I think you'd be useless if it wasn't for me!"

The big Jaffa that he'd identified as Teal'c looked at the hallucination in surprise. "He is the Doctor?" the big man said disbelievingly.

The apparition of Sam who-couldn't-be-real-she-was-_dead, oh Rassilon it was all his fault, _smirked. "Yep, disappointing, isn't it?" Then she gave the Jaffa a genuine grin that made the Doctor's hearts ache. "Don't worry T. He can be pretty badass when he's in the. . ." She trailed off, looking worried and the Doctor backed up as the ghost stepped towards him. "Doctor," it said slowly, "are you okay?"

"Oh just fine!" he said hysterically. "Hallucinating dead people, you know. But otherwise fine!"

Sam blinked. "Why would you be hallucinating?" she said suspiciously. "Have they been giving you drugs?"

"I thought not," the Doctor replied hoarsly. "But I must be wrong. You can't be here. You were shot by Ba'al's Jaffa. I couldn't protect you, Sam. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry Sam. I'm so. . ." The Doctor stopped as guilt closed up his throat, tears flowing down his face.

The Doctor shook slightly as the silver haired soldier, O'Neill, put a hand on his arm. "It's okay Doctor," he said gently, "she's really there. Trust me, she's been a pain in my ass ever since we dragged her through the stargate to earth. The kid actually took a swing at me, can you believe that?"

"Sam?" the Doctor whispered, reaching towards the apparition, daring to hope just for a second.

"Hello!" She waved, smiling at him.

"SAM!"

"Oh, ew! Get off, you stink!" Sam yelled as she was almost bowled over by the ecstatic Time Lord.

"You cheeky little brat," the Doctor scolded happily. "Just shut up and let me hug you for once. I thought, I thought you were. . . "

"Yeah okay, go ahead," Sam said, submitting to the enthusiastic embrace and leaning against the Doctor's chest. "But only 'cos you thought I was dead. You are _such_ a dumbass."

"Uh huh," the Time Lord said, the genuine smile on his face lighting up the room as he looked down at the teen.

"Oh, alright," Sam admitted, her voice a muffled whisper. "I was worried about you too."


	9. Mr Woolsey's Very Bad Day

Eventually the Doctor stepped back, letting go of Sam and eyeing the green BDU she was wearing. "What_ are_ you wearing?" he exclaimed, a slight edge of disapproval in his tone. "You look like a cut-price G.I. Joe."

"Says the guy who's covered in . . ." Sam began, looking disdainfully at the doctor's muddy clothing. Then she paused. "Actually what is that stuff? It smells like. . ."

"Exactly what it is," the Doctor finished for her.

The girl made a disgusted face and stuck out her tongue. "Oh. Ick."

"Ahem," O'Neill said, clearing his throat. "I hate to break up the touching reunion kids, but we need to get out of here before someone comes to investigate the big explosion.

"Oh. Right," the Doctor said, looking for all the world as if the fact that he was deep in an enemy dungeon had completely slipped his mind. "Right," he said again. "Escape. Good idea."

"We still need to deal with the Ancient weapon O'Neill," Teal'c reminded his team leader.

There was an odd note in the Jaffa's voice and his eyes kept flicking towards the Doctor. Jack privately suspected that his brother-in-arms wasn't quite convinced that the skinny guy in the dirty suit was the 'Oncoming Storm' that the Free Jaffa thought so highly of and frankly, Jack didn't blame him. The guy didn't look impressive at all and Jack had a hard time picturing him as some sort of legendary figure.

However, Jack was a veteran soldier with many battles (and a few black OPs missions) under his belt. As such, he prided himself on having excellent instincts. Right now, said instincts were taking one look at this skinny, dishevelled man in the pinstripe suit and telling their owner to run the hell away from him. This did not match with the picture Jack's eyes were giving him, so at the moment he was feeling. . . twitchy.

"Right," O'Neill replied. "The weapon." He reluctantly turned towards the skinny man. "Any way you can help us out with that Doc?" he asked.

The man's eyes narrowed and O'Neill suddenly found himself the focus of a very intense stare. "That depends Colonel," the Doctor said. "Exactly what do you intend to do with Ba'al's new toy once you've taken it from him?"

O'Neill had a brief mental image of his instincts (which he imagined looked like jelly babies for some reason) saying 'I told you so' to his eyes. The happy-go-lucky look which had asserted it self on the man's face when he'd realised Sam Junior wasn't a hallucination had vanished. So too had the look of pained heartbreak, though O'Neill felt he could still see a trace of pain hidden behind the man's eyes. Now, the skinny British-sounding guy in the suit was wearing an expression of utmost seriousness and Jack had the vaguely unreasonable feeling that the wrong reply to the man's question would lead to _something_ bad.

"Our mission was to rescue you and help you destroy the device if you could," the Colonel explained. "Okay?"

The serious look on the Doctor's face vanished as if it had never been and he beamed. "Came to rescue me? Aww! You shouldn't have! Thanks!"

Sam Junior coughed, interrupting the Doctor's flow of gratitude. "Doctor? The weapon?" she said pointedly. "Shouldn't we be getting on with destroying it? And, you know, escaping?"

"Right!" the Doctor said again, taking Sam's hand and heading for the door. "Let's get a move on then. If I recall the schematics of this place correctly, there should be a secret passage way out of here in the next corridor to our left. I'm fairly sure our unfriendly neighbourhood System Lord doesn't know about it, so it'll be a good place to hide while we make plans. Allons-y!"

O'Neill's team turned to him for approval. He shrugged. "You heard the man. Let's go."

"Wait a minute," Daniel protested as SG-1 followed Sam and the Doctor down the passage-way. "Jack, you speak french?"

"Yeah, sure, youbetcha."

###

In an office deep under Cheyenne Mountain, General George Hammond smiled welcomingly at Richard Woolsey and did his best to keep the fact that he wanted to boot the man off of his base with a very big boot from showing on his face.

"Mr. Woolsey," the General asked politely, "to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?"

Dressed immaculately in a dark grey suit and sensible shoes, Richard Woolsey appeared very out of place in the concrete surroundings of Cheyenne Base with it's population of Air Force Personnel, who were all dressed in well-used colour coded uniforms (mostly plain blue and green, Hammond conceded privately, but _still)_ and heavy regulation-issue boots.

Woolsey, in his extremely proper business suit and tie, looking almost like a visitor from another planet, represented what the General had always felt was the IOA's main problem. The Air Force personnel who worked in Cheyenne Base wore soldier's uniforms. They were highly trained individuals, ready to defend the Earth from hostile aliens at the drop of a hat. The IOA representatives . . . wore business suits and ties and sensible little shoes which wouldn't last more than five minutes in the environments which some of Hammond's offworld teams found themselves in.

They read reports in the comfort of heated offices here on Earth and thought that that was enough to let them understand the situations that the SGC had found itself in, thought that they had enough knowledge to make decisions which could affect the entire world. As if shutting down the stargate would stop the Goa'uld from coming by ship, or as if stealing all technology they came across would do anything more than earn Earth a dozen more enemies it didn't need. The bottom line, as far as General Hammond was concerned, was that the IOA simply didn't understand that for the last half-a-decade, Earth and the SGC in particular, had been fighting on the front lines in an extremely vicious war.

The balding, fussy little man sniffed in response to the General's question. "General Hammond," he said importantly, the disapproving tone in his voice all-too-clear. "It has come to the IOA's attention that the girl that SG-1 found on P3X-529, has accompanied them _back _through the gate. My superiors demand an explantion for your decision to allow an untrained civilian who may well be from Earth, back into such a perilous situation."

"Oh she's definitely from Earth," Hammond said mildly, leaning back in his chair. "She confirmed that for us."

"Then what were you thinking, General?" Woolsey demanded. "The girl had absolutely no authorization to go through the stargate and-

"She had _my _authorisation," Hammond said sharply, cutting off Woolsey mid-sentence. "And that's all she needed Mr. Woolsey."

Woolsey closed his mouth and visibly pulled himself together. "Even so General," he continued in a more conciliatory tone of voice, "given the girl's. . . unique qualities, the IOA have decided that she would be far better off under their direct supervision."

"As a lab rat, you mean," Hammond snapped, tiring of the Woolsey's political double-speak.

"That's entirely uncalled for General," Woolsey said, nervously fiddling with his cufflinks, which Hammond guessed meant he'd hit the nail on the head. "I merely meant that the IOA has much better suited places to see to the welfare of a teenager than a top-secret military base does."

"Ah," Hammond said icily, "you'd prefer she was in a top secret lab instead?"

"General, really!" Woolsey protested. "My superiors only have the child's best interests at heart."

Hammond snorted quietly. "Whether they do or not, Mr. Woolsey," he replied, "the point is now moot. Ms. Sullivan has left this base and should she return I doubt she would agree to go anywhere with a representative of the IOA."

"It will not be up to her," Woolsey said flatly, some of his confidence returning. "The IOA's decision is that you radio SG-1 and make sure they know that they are under orders to bring the girl back to Earth, along with this. . . Doctor. If there's some alien randomly picking up American citizens and going off to who knows where with them, then-"

"Yes, I thought you might get to that," Hammond said, once again cutting off Woolsey's speech. The General reached into a drawer and withdrew an extremely thick file. "In fact," he said, "Ms. Sullivan is not American. She's a citizen of the Republic of Ireland. The Republic is not, of course, a member of the UN security council and so they have no knowledge of the stargate. So, in lieu of contacting her government, _my_ direct superiors ordered me to send a report detailing Ms. Sullivan and the Doctor to the security council representatives. You can imagine my surprise when the British ambassador and a member of UNIT appeared at my door with this file. You are familiar with UNIT, I assume?"

Hammond paused and pushed the thick, overflowing file towards Woolsey, who took it hesitantly. "Of, of course," the bespectacled man stammered. "They're the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce, although I think there was a debate over renaming them recently."

"Correct," Hammond said. "Their UK branch sent over that file, because they are the ones with the most experience concerning the Doctor. Hence the British Ambassador's presence. In light of the information UNIT have provided, the joint-chiefs informed me that all decisions regarding Ms. Sullivan had to be run by the Security Council and the leaders of UNIT first. I can say with confidence that they will override the IOA directive you've just given me."

"That's nonsense!" Woolsey cried indignantly, rising to his feet, "the IOA will-"

"Mr. Woolsey," Hammond interrupted again, his voice taking on a commanding tone born of years of experience, "I suggest you save your complaints and _read that file._ Take your time, I can wait," he finished pleasantly.

Woolsey sat, suddenly cowed by Hammond's presence and opened the file. As one of his talents happened to be speed reading, it did not take him long to finish reading the extraordinarily thick file.

Woolsey looked at Hammond, his face suddenly pale. "Oh," he said weakly.

"Exactly," Hammond replied. "Attempting to force Ms. Sullivan to do anything that she doesn't want to do will likely. . . _upset_ the Doctor. Which, as you've just read, is not the course of wisdom." He paused before continuing, "She is under the age of eighteen, so the IOA might want to present their case to her legal guardians instead."

"Yes?" Woolsey said hopefully, clutching at this straw.

"However," Hammond said, a seemingly sincere smile on his lips, "Ms. Sullivan informed us that her parents passed away some years ago. It appears, that to all intents and purposes, the Doctor _is_ her legal guardian. You'd be obliged to present your case to him. In person."

Woolsey paled even further. "Thank you General Hammond," he replied shakily, getting to his feet. "I think I'll pass. I'll inform my superiors of the situation. Thank you for your time."

After Woolsey shut the door, George Hammond waited until he was sure the IOA representative was completely out of earshot before indulging in some extremely un-General-like snickering.


	10. Uh Oh

As the SG team and Sam followed him down a dark corridor, the Doctor began to knock on the walls, searching for the hidden passage that he knew was close by. If he was right, it would take them straight to the lab where Ba'al had his scientists working to repair the small amount of damage that the Doctor had done to the System Lord's new toy.

When a knock on the wall to his left made a hollow sound, the Doctor knew he'd found what he was looking for. Cleaning a stray bit of muck out of his sonic screwdriver, he brought it up to a certain spot on the wall and squeezed. Long forgotten mechanisms groaned and squeaked into life and a huge panel of the wall swung inwards, revealing a dark foreboding passageway.

True to form, Sam stuck out her tongue in mild disgust and said, "If there's spiders in there, I'm sticking behind you Doctor, got that?"

The Doctor grinned and pulled her after him, quickly followed by SG-1. Just as they'd all made it safely inside the passageway, the panel slid shut and moments later the sound of boots echoing on stone from the other side of the wall let the small group know that they'd narrowly avoided a Jaffa patrol.

Major Carter let out a sigh of relief as she pulled out a flashlight and flicked it one. "Close one," she commented to Daniel, who nodded in agreement.

"Well, come on!" the Doctor cried. The SGC team turned towards him and blinked in collective surprise when they realised the Doctor and Sam were already halfway down the dark passage, the Doctor's odd screwdriver having been converted into a small but powerful flashlight.

"Hey!," O'Neill called in mock indignation. "Wait for us kids!"

"Oi!" the Doctor's irritated voice floated back along the passage. "Watch it! I've got nine centuries on you, Sonny Jim! So watch who you're calling a kid."

Jack sighed, unsure whether to believe the man or not, and signaled to his team to catch up with the two time travellers.

###

Teal'c was, in a word, confused. And he didn't much like it. The big Jaffa had spent his life following certainties. If one certainty was proved false, as had happened when he realised Apophis was not a god, then it became replaced with a new certainty. In the case of Apophis, Teal'c had been certain that the strangely dressed warrior who claimed to be from a place that the Gods denied existed, had been telling the truth when he'd stood in the dungeon on Chulak and declared to Teal'c : _"I can save these people! Help me!"_

O'Neill had indeed been telling the truth. Now Teal'c fought alongside him in their quest to free the galaxy from the tyranny of the Goa'uld and was proud to call the man his commanding officer and his _der-hak-dar,_ or, as Daniel Jackson had explained to O'Neill when he'd asked for a translation, his Honour-Brother.

So, following certainties had always worked for Teal'c. Except now, one of the biggest certainties of his life, one of the greatest heroes of the Jaffa nation, a prophet of great power and righteousness. . . had turned out to be lanky, rake-thin man in a brown pinstriped suit that reminded Teal'c of the kind of clothes the IOA representatives (otherwise known to Teal'c as bloody idiots) wore. Or at least, that was who the man claimed to be. Teal'c was unsure.

The Oncoming Storm of legend had been described as a great warrior, a powerful and noble lord who could make armies flee in his wake, _not _a skinny, spiky-haired man who couldn't stop talking. And yet, there was a sense of power around the man that was completely at odds with his appearance. A sense that the wrong word could be your last. Teal'c could see that O'Neill had picked up on it and he was fairly sure that Major Carter and Daniel Jackson had too. So, as the followed the man down the secret passage he'd showed them, Teal'c kept a close eye on him.

He also kept a close eye on the young woman, Samantha Sullivan. Something about her still struck the former First Prime as not-quite-right. Something in the way she held herself made him remember that the Oncoming Storm's companions were considered by many cultures which had legends about him to be formidable adversaries in their own right.

Some had mythical titles of their own, like the Bad Wolf, the Healing Woman and the Ginger Goddess. And while Samantha Sullivan did not appear to match any of those descriptions, the fact remained that she travelled with the man, who, Teal'c had to admit, _could_ be the Oncoming Storm. And then there was the casual way she'd mentioned handling a carnivorous alien . . . Not to mention her utter dismissal of Ba'al being any threat whatsoever.

The girl was no warrior and while she was reasonably fit, she was clearly not suited for combat. So why, back at the SGC, when she'd promised to take him apart should he cause the Doctor any pain, had he felt threatened?

###

The passage the Doctor had found was dark and dusty with disuse. To Sam's great disgust it was filled with cobwebs and before she could stop herself, she reached out and took the Doctor's hand, squeezing it like a scared child in need of reassurance. And to be honest, Sam was still a bit scared. All the worry she'd been carrying since splitting from the Doctor and going through the stargate with SG-1 had not dissipated upon finding him again. True, when she'd first seen him in the cell, all other thoughts had been driven from her mind by the sheer relief that he _was _still alive.

Then, when she had _really_ looked at him and seen the filth on his clothes, the redness around his eyes and the tearstains making thin tracks down his cheeks Sam had been shocked and terrified. She had seen him stand up to monsters and aliens and godlike beings and laugh in their faces. The knowledge that Ba'al had done something that could make the Doctor cry horrified the seventeen-year-old. The Doctor _never_ cried. Or at least, she acknowledged, she had never seen him do so.

In that instant, a hundred horrible possibilities had whirled through the teenager's head, one thought forcing itself out of the throng above all others: _Get him out of there._ So she had pressed hard enough on the sonic screwdriver to make the door control explode, and rushed into the cell, yelling angrily at the Doctor, because if she didn't yell, she would cry and after her parents had died, Sam had sworn never to cry in front of her family again. The look on the Doctor's face when she had insulted him had nearly broken her heart when she'd realised he thought she wasn't real.

Ba'al had done that, she thought furiously. Ba'al had made her so scared she had yelled at the Doctor and been rude to him when all he wanted was a hug. Ba'al had told the Doctor she was dead, had made the Doctor think it was his fault. The Doctor, who had always seemed impossibly upbeat and enthuasiastic about everything, who never made so much as a sad face unless he was sure she wasn't looking, had been _crying_. No, Sam corrected herself, not crying. From the looks of it, he'd been bawling his eyes out. Sam had disapproved of the System Lord in a general way when the Doctor had first told her what the Goa'uld was, but now she _hated_ him.

"Sam? You alright?"

Sam jumped slightly as the Doctor's voice interrupted her thoughts. She looked up and saw him looking at her in concern. He was also wincing slightly and she realised with embarrasment that she was still holding his hand in a vice-like grip. The teenager let go immediately and stuck her hands in her pockets.

"Yeah," she replied, looking at her feet as she answered the Doctor's question, so that he wouldn't see the hate on her face. "Im fine. Just fine. What about you?"

"Oh, you know me," the Doctor said lightly, a goofy grin on his face. "I'm always alright."

_You complete liar!_ said a voice in the back of Sam's head. But she didn't voice the thought aloud. Right now she needed desperately to believe that the Doctor was alright. That he had recovered from whatever Ba'al had put him through and that the pain and despair she had seen on his face when she'd first entered the cell was truly gone. So she grinned at him as if everything was alright and resisted the urge to try and hold his hand again.

###

As O'Neill's team followed the Doctor and his young friend down the dusty passageway, the Colonel decided that it was high time they got some concrete answers from the skinny alien. So when the Doctor was finished reassuring the kid that he was A-OK, Jack strolled up beside him and casually asked "So Doc, when did ya decide to destroy the Ancient weapon after you heard Ba'al had it? The kid was kind of vague on the details of what happened before you two got separated."

The Doctor's eyes flicked towards Jack for a second before he looked down at Sam, eyebrows raised. She shrugged. "What? I had other things on my mind, ok?"

"Ah," the Doctor replied, nodding in understanding. Then he turned to face Jack, a grin on his face. "Alright Colonel, what would you like to know?"

"Well," Jack began, "from what the kid told us about you, I know you're a smart guy. Why did you decide to take on Ba'al? He has hundreds, if not thousands of Jaffa at his beck and call on this planet alone. Why take the risk, especially with the kid along?"

The grin faded from the Doctor's face and his expression darkened so much that a chill ran down O'Neill's spine.

"Because Colonel," the Doctor replied in a serious voice, "that old weapon is unbelievably dangerous. It's not like the bog-standard alien technology that the Alterans or the Lanteans or whatever you want to call them like to leave lying around the galaxy. It was built by a far more malevolent race and if I don't disable it properly before Ba'al can use it, that overdramatic pompous windbag will destroy half the universe by accident with his new toy." He paused before adding, "and as for Sam, as I'm sure you've seen, she can handle herself. It's in her blood."

"Wait a minute," Daniel Jackson interjected in a surprised tone. "You mean the weapon's not Ancient?"

"Oh it is," the Doctor told him. "Very old. Very, very old. Very, very,_ very_ old."

"Ah, Doctor?" Sam said, interrupting the Time Lord's rambling. "That's not what he meant. The Ancients are what the SGC guys call the Alterans."

"Oh."

"So Ba'al's weapon was not built by the Ancients?" Teal'c asked, repeating Daniel's question.

The Doctor shook his head, dislodging dust and cobwebs from his hair as he let out a bitter laugh. "No, no, no. Even those negelectful shortsighted idiots were smart enough not to build something that dangerous. The weapon was built by a race called the Daleks." The Doctor paused and looked around at their faces. "I can see by your expressions you've heard of them. Sam told you about them, I suppose?"

O'Neill nodded slowly, suddenly well aware why the Doctor would risk going against Ba'al to destroy the weapon. If it had been designed by the race that had destroyed his people, the all-powerful Time Lords that the kid had described, no wonder he wanted it gone.

Jack coughed to clear his throat. "Uh, yeah," he answered. "She gave us the rundown. Nasty guys, by all accounts. Uh, are they likely to show up asking for their weapon back?"

The Doctor shook his head again, and his lips twisted. "No," he assured the Colonel in an odd flat voice as he brushed his sweaty hair out of his eyes with a filthy hand. "There are no more Daleks as far as I know. It's highly unlikely one would show up here. We don't have to worry about Daleks. What we do have to worry about is someone else trying to use their technology. Trust me, it never ends well."

###

When his First Prime burst into the throne room and informed him that SG-1 and the Doctor had somehow escaped their cell and disappeared, Ba'al's first instinct was to use his hand device and burn out the man's brain. However, luckily for Kyprac son of Ruac, two thoughts stopped the System Lord from acting on his homicidal impulses.

The first thought was that he really couldn't afford to break in a new First Prime at the moment, so he might as well let the relatively experienced, if somewhat lately failure-prone one that he already had live. The second thought was a snarky inner voice which said that _of course_ SG-1 had escaped. What had he expected? That was what they _did._ Appearing through the Chappa'ai, wrecking the plans of the System Lord in the immediate vicinity and escaping back to earth was their modus operandi. They would go on repeating the pattern until they were dead.

As he stood and roared at the First Prime to find SG-1 and the Doctor, Ba'al cursed his unfortunate decision to have SG-1 elaborately executed and vowed that from now on, his standing orders would be to have them shot immediately upon capture. Many times. In the head. And dismembered on the spot.

Once the pale-faced First Prime had departed, having been assured that one more failure would result in the most painful execution Ba'al's genius could come up with, the suave System Lord quickly made his way to the laboratory containing the Ancient weapon. It had been hours since he'd last visited the scientists and given them an object example of the penalty for failure, so Ba'al expected that by now, the snivelling cowards would have made at least a little headway in repairing and activating the Ancient weapon.

It was therefore with some surprise that he entered the lab and beheld the scene of absolute carnage that was before him. It was with even more surprise and some numb shock that he realised that the culprit behind the deaths of his scientists and the destruction of his most advanced lab was the large metal pepperpot with an egg whisk and some sort of plumbing tool stuck to the front of it.

"What manner of being are you?" Ba'al demanded making sure that his eyes flashed and his voice echoed. This mechanical interloper would regret taking on a god!

The metal being's eyestalk swung around and regarded the outraged System Lord in the doorway. Then it spoke, it's voice a tinny-sounding screech.

"I-AM-A-DA-_LEK_! WE-ARE-THE-SUPERIOR-BEINGS! LESSER-SPECIES-WILL-BE-EXTERMINATED! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! _EXTERMINATE!_"


	11. Explosives or Chocolate?

As the laser bolt which the mechanical contrivance had fired at him hit his energy shield, Ba'al sniffed disparagingly and looked down his nose at the pepperpot-shaped intruder which had killed his scientists and destroyed the lab.

"I am a God," he said in his most condescending tone, confident in his personal energy shield's ability to protect him against the pepperpot's laser. "You cannot harm me."

The machine did not respond. Instead, it backed up a few metres and extended its rubber appendage in Ba'al's direction. The Goa'uld gazed at it warily and just as he opened his mouth to demand answers from the thing which had identified itself as a Dalek, it spoke.

"SCAN-INDICATES-PARASITICAL-LIFE-FORM-WITHIN-A-HUMAN-HOST! YOU-ARE-NOT-A-DEITY!" It paused for a second, rotating the rubber appendage again. "SPECIES-CLASSIFICATION:GOA-ULD. EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"

The Dalek fired again and again, the bolts fizzling harmlessly against the orange glow which surrounded the Goa'uld. However, with each bolt it absorbed, the glow lessened. A look at the shield generator hanging on his belt told Ba'al that the energy protecting him from the Dalek wouldn't last much longer.

As if to confirm Ba'al's fears, the Dalek stopped firing briefly and extended the plunger-like apparatus in his direction again. "ENERGY SHIELD: WEAKENING," it proclaimed. "EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"

Ba'al decided at that point that it was time to abandon his godly dignity and he ran from the lab as fast as he could, short-circuiting the door controls on his way out. If he was lucky, the Dalek would be trapped. Except, he thought, his weapon had been damaged, his scientists were dead, the man who'd damaged the weapon had escaped, been captured, escaped again, been captured _again_ and surprise, surprise, escaped again. Most likely in the company of SG-1, who had gone through the capture and escape routine so many times that Ba'al's dungeons might as well have a revolving door installed. And now they were all wandering around somewhere in his base. Luck was clearly not on his side today.

The way things were going, Ba'al thought sourly as he contacted his First Prime and ordered him to take a squad and destroy the Dalek, the weapon would probably get completely destroyed, his base would be ruined by plastic explosives (supplied by O'Neill of course,) the Doctor would turn out to indeed be the Oncoming Storm and would wreak terrible revenge upon Ba'al for the murder of his friend (who was probably alive and well and relaxing somewhere warm, the little brat,) and then, just as they all escaped through the Chappa'ai, O'Neill would make one of his infuriating snarky _comments _that always seemed designed to drive Ba'al insane.

Oh, and he'd just remembered, they still hadn't found all the explosive power cells that the Doctor had stolen from the Jaffa patrols.

Ba'al groaned.

###

Richard Woolsey sighed inwardly and resisted the urge to hang up the phone. On the other end of the line, his superior continued to harangue him.

"Are you listening to me, Woolsey?" the IOA representative heard, holding the phone back slightly in order to avoid being deafened. "Do you know what that girl's DNA could be worth? According to our analysis of Doctor Fraiser's report, she is practically invulnerable to disease! We have to get control of her!"

"We don't have a legal foot to stand on Sir," Woolsey replied, secretly hoping that his superior, one Robert Kane, would be suddenly struck dumb by acute laryngitis. "She hasn't done anything illegal and she is not a threat to national security. We cannot detain her. Not to mention, detaining her legally or otherwise will no doubt anger the Doctor. As the dossier the British Government and UNIT sent you makes clear, sir, this would not be a good thing for any of us."

There was a dismissive snort from the other end of the phone line. "Rubbish. The Brits are just exaggerating! One alien can't possibly be that dangerous, and if he is, they should have got shot of him years ago."

"Sir," Woolsey said, in what he hoped was a placating tone, "we are part of the **International** Oversight Advisory. Whether you like it or not sir, you have to take the British representative's opinion into account and she is not supporting us on this. Neither are the Russian and French representatives."

"What about the Chinese?" Kane demanded.

"The Chinese representative isn't available to comment on support or the lack thereof, sir," Woolsey replied. "He's currently in the hospital having his stomach pumped."

"What? Why?"

"He has acute food poisoning sir. Apparently he ate some _very _bad chow mein," Woolsey explained.

"Oh."

There was silence for a moment while Kane digested this information. After a minute Woolsey heard the sound of Kane clearing his throat. "Listen Woolsey," his superior said in what Woolsey privately thought was an annoyingly self-righteous tone, "this girl has the potential to save thousands of lives. We need access to her and she needs to be in a safe place. I'm aware that she's an orphan. If we don't monitor her, then somebody like the rogue N.I.D. agents who are still out there might come across her. We can't let her fall into the wrong hands. It's vital that we protect the child. Find a way to convince Hammond to hand her over to us."

As he listened to Kane continue to explain why it was vitally important that the young woman be under IOA supervision, General Hammond's words echoed unpleasantly in Woolsey's mind. The General had made it clear that he thought giving custody of the girl to the IOA's scientists would make her no better than a lab rat. Woolsey wanted to believe that wasn't true, but the political talk that Kane was gushing had become a lot more difficult to take as sincere once Woolsey had remembered that the man had ties to a multibillion dollar pharmaceutical coalition, who would no doubt make millions if a sample from the girl found its way into their labs before anyone else's.

_Oh what the hell,_ Woolsey thought. _I didn't take this job to have kids locked up. _

"Sorry sir, what was that last bit? I . . .kkth. . . hear you. . .kkth . . . breaking up. . . gkth. . . interference . . . kkth. . . stargate." Woolsey hung up the phone with guilty satisfaction. "Well, clearly nothing left for me to do here," he said to himself with a small, pleased smirk. "Better get back to the office. After I get some coffee from the cafeteria. Some coffee would be good right now. And a slice of that nice pie, with some cream on the side."

With that, the IOA representative dusted off his hands and strode in the direction of the base's cafetaria, his back a little straighter and a small spring in his step. Around the corner, Sgt. Siler, the head of base maintenance, made a mental note to make an entry into the logs regarding the freak temporary intereference that the Stargate could cause in the phone lines. Just in case anybody ever came asking.

###

As a rule, Jack O'Neill didn't like surprises. Mostly because the vast majority of surprises in his career as an Air Force officer had consisted of 'the enemy reinforcements have surrounded us sir!' and 'there's an alien parasite from another planet inside his head' and of course 'the Goa'uld are on their way here in very big spaceships and Kinsey's just convinced the president to shut down the SGC'.

So when SG-1 and their two time-travelling acquaintances finally reached the end of the dark secret tunnel and the sounds from the other side of the wall made the Doctor's face freeze and Sam Junior's face go white with horror, Jack figured he was in for another nasty surprise. It sounded, to Jack, like a squad of Jaffa were fighting someone. Since that hadn't fazed the kid earlier, Jack was eager to find out what exactly was different about this time. He was just about to demand an explanation from the Doctor when one voice rose above the battle cries and screams of terror. It was an ear-wrenching, tinny screech.

"EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"

"Okay Doc," Jack snapped during the brief lull of sound that followed the screech. "What the hell is that and why did both of you look like death warmed over the second you heard it?"

The Doctor's bitter, hollow laugh somehow echoed loudly over the screams and yells coming from the laboratory on the other side of the wall. "They survived," he said bitterly, ignoring the Colonel's question. "Always. _Always_, they survive and I lose everything I care about! How the hell did this one get away?"

"Doctor," Jack said warningly, trying to convey in that one word that he didn't have a lot of time for craziness and ranting right now. He unconsciously raised the Zat'nik'atel he was carrying as another screech of "EXTERMINATE!" echoed through the wall.

It was young Sam who finally answered, putting a shaking hand on the Colonel's arm in an effort to make him lower his gun. Jack had only ever seen the terror that was in her face on someone else's a few times before and, without exception, that had involved Goa'uld, torture, and a lot of innocent people running for their lives while their so-called Gods killed them without a second thought. So, it was with a certain amount of resignedness that the Colonel listened to the teenager say "it's a Dalek. There's a Dalek in that lab."

"As in, the crazy Nazi-species that were specifically bred to indiscriminately kill every other species in the universe?" Daniel asked in clarification, his tone conveying that he really hoped Sam Junior would say 'just kidding.'

Unfortunately for Daniel, he was destined to be disappointed. The Doctor answered him instead. "Yes," he said quietly. "And if we don't stop it here, it will kill every living being on this planet before moving on to the next one and starting the entire process again."

"But I thought you said they were extinct?" Carter protested.

The Doctor shrugged. "I thought they were," he replied. "But they have a knack for somehow hanging on."

Jack sighed. "And here I thought this day couldn't get any worse. Alright Doc, you're the expert on fighting this thing. My primary plan is that we rush into that lab and shoot the hell out of that thing. Any objections?"

"Yes," the Time Lord snapped. "You'll be gunned down before it finishes the first cry of 'exterminate.' He paused. "Use explosives instead."

"All our plastic explosives were confiscated when we were captured," Teal'c informed the Doctor.

"Oh." The Doctor paused again and then grinned. "Well, good thing for you lot, the Jaffa didn't bother to search my pockets a second time." To the collective bewilderment of SG-1, the Doctor began to pull many, many staff-weapon power cells out of his apparently flat and empty pockets. The Doctor saw the look on their faces and grinned so widely that Jack half expected the top of the man's head to fall off. "Bigger on the inside," he explained happily to the bewildered humans.

Sam, on the other hand, did not seem to share the Doctor's enthusiasm. "Doctor?" she asked in a sweet tone of voice that set off alarm bells in Jack O'Neill's head.

He looked over at her, still grinning. "Yes Sam?"

"Do you mean to tell me, that you have been carrying _high grade explosives_ around in your _pants?" _The sugary sweetness was now gone and the Doctor was faced with Sam, who had somehow morphed from a rather sparky teenager into someone's disapproving mother, complete with 'how-could-you-be-so-irresponsible' fury. He gulped and desperately tried to back track as the irate teen demanded to know where he'd gotten the explosive and what the hell he'd been planning to do with it in the first place.

The entire scene, Jack thought, was rather like a bad train wreck. You didn't want to look, but you couldn't look away. The Doctor was trying high speed technobabble even better than Carter's in an effort to distact his friend, but, O'Neill noted impressedly, she wasn't falling for it.

"You _moron!"_ she hissed quietly, having been reminded by the Doctor that yelling would probably alert the Dalek. "Don't _ever_ do something like that because of me or I'll kill you myself!" Then she sagged, apparently worn out.

The Doctor produced something else from his pocket and held it out as a peace offering. "Chocolate?" he asked apologetically.

The bar was grabbed and summarily devoured before he could finish saying the word.

Jack looked at the Doctor curiously. "You got anymore?" he asked hopefully.

The Time Lord shook his head. "No, sorry. Only more converted power cells. Well, and a packet of jelly babies."

"Think I'll stick with the explosives," the Colonel decided.

###

Within the lab, all the noise had died away. The surviving Jaffa, of which there were very few, had fled, once again jamming the door behind them. The lab walls were blackened with scorch marks from laser blasts. The floor was littered with bodies. Scientist and Jaffa lay side by side, dead before they had even hit the ground. The only thing that remained alive in the laboratory was the Dalek.

The Dalek itself, though not defeated by any means, was badly damaged. It had not been fully functional when it had arrived on this planet in response to the homing signal the Great Exterminator was emitting, and though exterminating the semi-human life-forms that the Goa'uld had as guards had not been hard, it had not been easy either. Some blasts from their staff weapons had made it past the Dalek's outer defense system. It's casing was dotted with scorch marks and it's primary weapon systems were badly damaged, though not inoperable.

So, the Dalek decided. what it needed to do now, was find a power outlet to replenish it self with. Then it could return to it's primary directive and exterminate the rest of the beings on this planet. The Daleks' eyestalk rotated as it scanned the lab, looking for any useful energy it could convert. "SCAN COMPLETE!" it declared. "POWER OUTLET FOUND." With that it levitated slightly, floating across the bodies that had previously blocked it's path.

Extending the plunger-like appendage, the Dalek fitted it neatly over the door controls and began to drain all power from the base systems. As it replenished it's own reserves the Dalek's systems began to self-repair. The outer casing of it's mechanical shell gleamed a golden colour, the scorch marks vanishing as if they'd never been. As power continued to drain away into the Dalek, the laboratory lights flickered and went out.

"FULL POWER RESTORED" the Dalek crowed triumphantly. "EXTERMINATION WILL BEGIN."

###

On the other side of the wall, the group of humans and one Time Lord looked at each other worriedly. It was Daniel Jackson who finally voiced what the others were thinking.

"That can't be good."


	12. Working Together

On the advice of the Doctor, everyone hurried back down the hidden passageway, before the Dalek could do a wider scan and detect them through the wall. Colonel O'Neill had initially been a little resistant to just retreating without throwing some explosives into the lab first, but the Doctor had pointed out that he hadn't configured the power cells to work correctly as of yet, so they wouldn't do much more than scratch the now fully powered up Dalek. Throwing explosives would only get it's attention and if the Dalek detected a Time Lord, it would attack full force immedietly, killing them all.

"Okay, so you've got a point," Jack admitted when the Doctor paused for breath. "In that case we need to get to a more defensible area so that we can attack that thing without endangering ourselves. You said you'd memorized the layout of this place, Doc. Any suggestions?"

"Ah. . .well," the Doctor replied awkwardly, "the best place to defend ourselves from the Dalek would be the throne room actually."

"No doubt Ba'al will have thought of that also," Teal'c interjected disapprovingly. "He will already be there with a full legion of his Jaffa."

"Well yes," the Doctor admitted. "That is a secondary consideration. But I don't think we have a choice. The only other place that we could defend ourselves properly in is the Tardis, and given that the Dalek has just powered itself up to full strength, we'd be dead before we ever got there."

"So instead you suggest we hand ourselves right back to Ba'al?" O'Neill asked disparagingly. "Great idea. Really. But if you don't mind, I think we'll go back to the original plan of shooting the hell out of that thing."

"That won't work!" the Doctor snapped exasperatedly. "Colonel, now that the Dalek has regenerated it's power supply, your guns are useless. Bullets will just bounce off and energy blasts will just be absorbed. You cannot fight it without explosives and I need time to configure the power cells correctly."

"So. . . what? We just hand ourselves over to Ba'al in the meantime?" Daniel asked, a trifle sarcastically.

"Yes. If we have to," the Doctor insisted.

"Well that's a _bad_ idea," O'Neill snarked, giving the Doctor an 'are you crazy?' look before realizing it was completely wasted on the Time Lord.

"Colonel," the Doctor said tightly, "I have been fighting these things for longer than all of you have been alive. I know what I'm talking about. And speaking of our unpleasant System Lord, I think it's quite likely that he'll agree to a temporary truce in exchange for us helping him to defeat the Dalek. Understand?"

"He's got a point sir," Major Carter volunteered. "If that thing is as dangerous as they say it is, then we may need all the help we can get."

"It's not like he hasn't agreed to work with us before," Daniel said.

"Yeah, and look how that turned out," O'Neill said pointedly.

"True. . . but I don't think we have a choice Jack. That thing is just too dangerous," Daniel argued. "We just heard it mow down an entire squad of Jaffa, remember?"

"Yes but-" the Colonel began before he was interrupted by Sam.

"Everyone this side of the galaxy will die," the teenager said quietly.

"Say what, kid?"

Sam looked up at the grey-haired man, her face very serious. "Once the Dalek has killed everyone in this palace, it'll start to repair that weapon. Then it'll use it to wipe out all sentient life this side of the galaxy."

"Say _what?_" the Colonel said, gaping at her.

"Didn't I tell you this already?" the Doctor asked SG-1, looking at them in mild surprise.

"No!"

"No!"

"Nuh-uh!"

"You did not."

"Oh, well," the Doctor replied with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Now you know."

"Now w-, now we-, now we KNOW? You didn't think we _needed _to know this?" O'Neill half shouted, stammering slightly in frustration.

"No," Sam told him, "he just forgot. He does that. He's still right though. We're gonna have to ask Ba'al for help. Unless you _want_ half of all sentient life in the galaxy to get their brains fried."

"Wait a minute," Carter protested. "How exactly does the weapon work? What do you mean by 'fried'?"

"Major Carter," the Doctor asked, "are you familiar with concept of a Delta wave?"

"Huh? Oh, yes," Carter replied. "It's an- oh. Oh. Not good. I'm guessing the Dalek's weapon creates a big one?"

The Doctor nodded. "Big enough to-"

"-fry half the people in the galaxy," Carter finished for him. She turned to O'Neill. "Sir, I hate to say it, but the Doctor is right. We may need Ba'al's help. We can't let that weapon be activated. Billions of people will die in an instant if it is. Everyone on Earth included."

O'Neill sighed resignedly, giving up. "All right then. Let's go surrender to Ba'al."

###

Kyprac son of Ruac, First Prime of Ba'al was hallucinating. The stress of the last two days had finally gotten to him, he decided. Clearly he was seeing things that weren't there. He could not be seeing SG-1, the Doctor (blasted_ nutcase_) and that annoying teenager he'd arrived with the other day, waltzing down the corridor of Lord Ba'al's palace like they owned the place.

"'Allo big fella!" the Doctor greeted him happily. Kyprac was not fooled. The alien was wearing _that grin._ The last time he'd been approached by the alien when he was wearing _that grin,_ he'd swiftly been knocked unconscious. Accordingly he raised his staff weapon and levelled it at the Doctor's face, noting gratefully that his men had already aimed their weapons at SG-1.

"Lay down your weapons," he ordered.

To Kyprac's surprise, O'Neill momentarily looked to the Doctor for instructions. The alien nodded happily at the grey-haired human and four zat-n'kat'els soon hit the floor.

"Well," the Doctor said enthusiastically, "now that everyone's disarmed, why don't you take us to your leader?"

Behind him, the teenager groaned. "What _is _it with you and that phrase?" she muttered. "Every time we go _anywhere_ you end up saying it. Every. Damn. Time."

"Language, Sam!" the Doctor admonished the teenager, completely ignoring the barrel of the staff weapon that was inches from his face.

Kyprac decided it was time to take control of the situation and barked "take them back to the cells! I will inform Lord Ba'al that the prisoners have been recaptured."

"Oh don't do that!" the Doctor cried. "That's a really bad idea. Trust me! You should take us to see Ba'al."

Kyprac began to walk away.

"Oh well," the Doctor said conversationally to the Taur'i O'Neill. "Looks like he doesn't mind being the reason for everyone in this solar system being dead by this time tomorrow."

"Yep. Looks like," O'Neill agreed. "Wonder if any of these guys have family on a nearby planet?"

Kyprac paused. It was a trick. It had to be. Except. . .

The Taur'i were, despite all their weakness and habit of relying on trickery, rather honourable. Cunning, infuriating warriors, yes. Gifted scientists, yes. But not in the habit of threatening innocent women and children. Unlike, Kyprac thought guiltily, certain System Lords. Of course Ba'al was a god and therefore had the right to do as he wished, but. . .

No, Kyprac thought, the Taur'i would not threaten billions of lives. But they might agree to work with a System Lord if they thought it could _save_ lives. What other explanation had he for the way they'd walked up to him, practically begging to be captured? Besides, Kyprac reassured himself, it wasn't as if taking them before Lord Ba'al would get him in trouble. If Lord Ba'al decided to kill them there and then, Kyprac would merely be commended for saving Lord Ba'al a trip to the cells.

"Very well," Kyprac decided. "We bring them before Lord Ba'al," he announced to his warriors.

"Oh that's brilliant!" the Doctor said loudly as they walked after Kyprac down the corridor. This was followed by a squawk of pain. The First Prime turned his head curiously. It seemed as though the brown-haired girl had stepped on the Doctor's foot. Maybe she wasn't so bad. Either way, the alien was no longer wearing _that grin,_ so Kyprac allowed himself to feel a little relieved.

###

Of all the things Ba'al had not expected to happen today, which included the Doctor's second escape, his companion's reappearance and SG-1's recapture within half-an-hour, (a new record. Ba'al made a mental note to congratulate his First Prime,) seeing said two-hearted alien follow Kyprac son of Ruac into his throne room along with the afore-mentioned SGC team and teenager and grin happily at him was at the top of the list.

"The Taur'i and their accomplice begged to be granted an audience with you my Lord," Kyprac announced.

Personally, Ba'al doubted they'd done anything of the sort. The Taur'i did not beg. They were annoyingly stubborn in that respect and his brief experience with the Doctor led him to believe that the two-hearted alien was much the same. Especially if he really was the Oncoming Storm. Ba'al expected it had been more of a demand along the lines of 'we have something snake-head wants. Kill us and he'll never get his hands on it. Nyah!'

"Speak!" he commanded.

O'Neill grinned. "You've got yourself a bit of a problem at the moment, Ba'al," he said in an insultingly condescending tone.

_No? Really? I hadn't noticed. Strange pepperpots slaughtering two entire patrols of Jaffa is the norm around here, _Ba'al thought sarcastically. Out loud, he drawled: "Yes. You are still alive. But that will be remedied shortly."

"Guess he has a death-wish then," the System Lord heard the teenage human mutter.

Ba'al turned towards the human girl, focusing his attention on her and making a valiant effort to ignore O'Neill. "Explain yourself child!" he demanded.

The girl glared at him, he gaze filled with hatred and disgust. However, when she spoke, her tone was relatively light. "Don't call me child," she snapped. "And we're talking about the Dalek. You know, the psychotic pepperpot that mowed through your soldiers like a bull in a china shop. You must know you can't beat it without our help."

Ba'al gave her a dismissive look. "If I, a god, cannot defeat this foe, what makes you think you can?"

"How about the fact that we keep kicking your butt?" O'Neill suggested with a grin. Ba'al glared venomously at him.

"Listen Ba'al," the Doctor spoke up, his tone commanding attention, "if we don't help each other, then everyone in this room and every single sentient being on this half of the galaxy will be dead by this time tomorrow. You don't have a choice. If you want to live, you must aid us."

Ba'al blinked and made a concentrated effort not to recoil from the commanding presence before him. Had the Doctor's eyes just _glowed?_

Dismissing this momentary thought, Ba'al considered the Doctor's words. He was of course tempted to go with 'Ha ha, no! Die suckers! (But more eloquently expressed of course,) but in light of his own experience with the thing that called itself a Dalek, this was sadly not an option. If the Doctor had a way to beat it. . .

"Tell me what you know of this machine," he demanded. "How can I know it is as fearsome an opponent as you claim?"

The Doctor looked at him steadily, his eyes turning dark like pools of oil. "You know who I am," he said simply.

"I know who you claim to be," Ba'al retorted, contriving to imply that he didn't believe the Doctor's claim to be an all-powerful force of nature for a second.

"Then you know of the Time War," the Doctor replied, _his _tone contriving to imply that he didn't give a hoot whether Ba'al believed him or not.

Ba'al nodded. "Your people and some enemy fought to their mutual extinction." He paused, a terrible suspicion blooming in his mind and when he spoke again he kept his voice firmly under control. "This Dalek. It's race were your people's opponents?"

"Exactly."

Every Jaffa in the room was shocked to see their god's face turn dead white and crease in fear.

Ba'al swallowed nervously. "Very well. You shall aid me in this abomination's destruction."

"Aw gee," O'Neill said. "Thanks a bunch."


	13. The Plan: Step One

Once Ba'al had accepted that what the Doctor said was true, he quickly got his face under control and pulled himself together. World destroying alien maniac on the premises or not, he was a System Lord and he was damned if he was going to be made a fool of in front of Colonel Jack O'Neill. Again.

Upon hearing the Doctor's explanation of just what the metal-encased intruder actually was, Ba'al promptly ordered his Jaffa to barricade the entrance to the throne room and assigned his First Prime to keep track of the armoured alien's progress with the security system terminal that was located in the corner of the opulent throne room. Usually a lesser Jaffa would be assigned to such a task, but right now Kyprac looked as if he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown and security monitoring placed him as far away from the Doctor as possible, a fact which had seemed to calm him somewhat.

Normally of course, such a disgraceful state of mind for a Jaffa who was supposed to be the absolute elite of his god's forces would result in an ignominious execution, but the current situation was sufficiently dire that Ba'al could not afford to waste anyone who could conceivably be used as living shield.

Marshalling his thoughts, the System Lord coughed importantly and turned his attention back to the Doctor, deciding to deal with the non-deceased presence of The Infuriating Taur'i in his throne room by ignoring him haughtily, as befitted a God who was far too important to deal with people who were as ants when compared to his majesty.

"So Doctor," he drawled, "you claim I cannot defeat this Dalek without your help. That rather suggests that _you_ cannot defeat it without mine, is that not so? You would hardly have surrendered otherwise."

"Oh I dunno," the Doctor said brightly, throwing out his arms. "I might have. Cessation of hostilities when you're in a tight spot tends to make things better I find. I love a good bit of surrendering."

Ba'al narrowed his eyes at the self-proclaimed Oncoming Storm as the man finished prattling. The Doctor's grin only grew wider. Behind him however, the human teenager removed her glasses and began to wipe them on her sleeve. From her exasperated and pained expression, Ba'al suspected she was only doing so since it meant that she couldn't see what the Doctor was doing.

"Enough of your irrelevant comments," the System Lord declared. "You requested my help. Therefore you have a plan to destroy the abomination, presumably a plan in which my resources play a vital part."

"Yep!" the Doctor interrupted happily.

"And obviously you and your Taur'i friends will also play an important role in this 'brilliant' plan? Because if they are of no use, I will have them executed post-haste," Ba'al continued, as if the Doctor had not spoken.

The effect of his words on the Time Lord was immediate. The man straightened to his full height and his expression seemed to freeze, locking in place. The air itself seemed to grow cold and once again, the System Lord found himself looking into eyes that seemed like dark pools of oil, ready to burst into flame. Just as they had before, Ba'al's primal instincts began scream _Danger! Danger! Get away!_

When the Doctor spoke again, his voice was soft and perfectly controlled, but there was an undercurrent of fury in it, which reminded Ba'al of the way he had snarled and raged upon being told the human girl was dead and worthless besides.

"I came to you with a peaceful offer so that we could all survive the monumentally huge crisis that _you_ are partially responsible for creating due to your greed and violence, and all you do is threaten my friends? _Again?_"

The Doctor strode forward until he was barely a foot from the raised dais where Ba'al sat upon his throne. "_No._ Do you understand? You will work with us, we will work with you, and maybe, just maybe, we'll all get out of this alive. But if you attempt to harm them, if you touch one hair on their heads, then that will be the end of you. Like I said before, your inevitable defeat is not a fixed point in time. If my friends are harmed, then I _will _destroy everything you have built. You will be left weeping and writhing in the dust!"

At this insult to their god, the Jaffa reacted instantly, readying their weapons. The System Lord also reacted, powering up the device of torture that he wore around his wrist. "You forget yourself, Doctor," the System Lord hissed, rising to his feet as every Jaffa in the room aimed their staff weapons at the alien's heart. "I am a God! I will not be insulted by the likes of you! You and your friends are unarmed. You have no power here. If I desire to kill you then you will die instantly with no choice in the matter."

"Oh?" the Doctor said quietly. "I think you'll find that I do have a choice. I have a choice whether or not to blow all of us to kingdom come right now."

"Wait, what?" O'Neill interrupted, an alarmed look on his face. "Doc, are you _crazy_?"

"Probably," the Doctor said with a shrug. "Doesn't mean I'm not serious though."

Ba'al snorted in disbelief and looked down on the Doctor from the dais. "And how will you do such a thing? You are clearly unarmed. Why should I take such a threat seriously?"

"Maybe because he has more than a pound of live explosives shoved down his pants?" Daniel Jackson interjected in a deadpan tone. "Where did you think the power cells from the Jaffa weapons he disabled went?"

Ba'al froze as a rather insane grin spread across the Time Lord's face while the archaeologist spoke. The Time Lord, who was less than a metre away him.

"Well, you know how it is," the Doctor said with a deceptively disarming shrug. "All that dangerous ordnance. I couldn't just leave it where it was, now could I? Anyone could've come across it. Might've been a terrible accident."

The System Lord looked hard at his enemy's face and then lowered his hand. The Jaffa followed his lead, once again holding their weapons at their sides.

"So Doc," O'Neill said, "now that we're not going to blow each other up, how about hearing this plan of yours."

Ba'al scowled. "Loathe as I am to agree with O'Neill on anything, I too would like to know how you plan to have us defeat a being that slaughtered two patrols of my best Jaffa."

"Well, first of all," the Doctor announced, "you should return SG-1's original weapons to them. Umm. . . You do still have them, don't you?"

"Yes," said Ba'al. "But why should I give my enemies back their weapons?"

"Because if you don't" the Doctor snapped, "then my plan won't work and we will all die when the Dalek hits us with a shot from it's tritinium laser and turns our nervous systems to charred jelly from the inside out. Of course it'll be different for you. Your host will die like the rest of us, but your slug-like body is so small the overload of energy will probably just melt you and then cook you like a sausage in a frying pan. "

"Ooh," Sam murmured to Major Carter in the background, "that sounds painful."

Carter nodded. "No kidding."

The Doctor coughed pointedly and Sam looked at him. "Oh. Sorry," she said innocently. "Didn't mean to interrupt. Please continue."

"Thanks awfully for your permission," the Doctor said dryly and then spun around, turning back to the rapidly angering System Lord. "Right," he said before Ba'al could explode at the interruption, "the Dalek out there is protected by that armoured outer shell and also by a personal force-field. Combined, those defences make it nigh-invulnerable. Except for one spot. The shield is weaker around the eye-stalk and damaging that will leave the Dalek temporarily blind albeit still well-defended, giving us time to disable it by other means."

"And you think SG-1 can do this using their primitive weapons? Preposterous!" Ba'al declared. "My Jaffa will blind the alien easily. I do not need the Taur'i."

The Doctor sighed. "I hate to say this," he said, "but SG-1 will succeed because they've got guns. The Dalek's force field is specifically designed to counter attacks from energy blasts. Your warriors' weapons are next to useless against it. Though it will also work against high velocity gunfire, I can adjust their weapons so that it will be far less effective. Due to the difference in the technological level, Col. O'Neill and his team have a much better chance of temporarily disabling the Dalek."

"Well, doesn't that sound familiar?" O'Neill muttered rhetorically. "Once again, only humanity is dumb enough to do the job."

"You certainly are!" the Doctor agreed with a grin.

O'Neill glared at him. "We might be dumb compared to you Doctor," he snapped, "but, keep in mind, we're not as dumb as you think."

"Ahh, right. Sorry," the Doctor said contritely.

_Interesting, _Ba'al thought, watching them carefully. _There seems to be some dissension among them. O'Neill and the Doctor . . . Both leaders who do not take kindly to being led? _

Aloud he said, "Even so, I have no need to return their weapons. My Jaffa shall use them instead."

"Riiight," a teenage voice drawled. "Great idea. So how many of your big mooks have ever actually used a gun. And by gun I mean something that spits projectiles and forces it's user to deal with recoil."

"Probably none Samantha Sullivan," the shol'va Teal'c answered her. "Doubtless the Jaffa here would merely shoot themselves in the foot if they attempted to use such a weapon. Staff weapons do not exhibit the recoil phenomenon."

"Knew it."

Ba'al resisted the urge to grind his teeth. Privately, he admitted the child and the shol'va had a point. None of his Jaffa had any experience with Taur'i weapons, (since being shot with them clearly didn't count). With time of course, he was confident his Jaffa could easily become proficient in the use of Taur'i weapons, but the Dalek had already shown him in the science lab that he didn't have that kind of time.

"Alright," Ba'al agreed, "but know this. If we had the time to train my Jaffa to use your weapons, then they would be using them to execute you, Warriors of the Taur'i."

"Yeah great," O'Neill said dismissively, "so can we get them back already?"

###

The Dalek moved through the empty halls of the stone structure with single-minded purpose. It had no name, no number, nothing to identify it separately from the millions of other Daleks that had once existed. The only difference between this Dalek and it's brethren who had been destroyed by the Doctor, was that it had survived.

But even that was nothing new really, the Dalek acknowledged. Surviving was what the Daleks _did._ It was what they'd been created for by Davros, what they'd been bred to do. Whatever the universe threw at them, the Daleks would always survive. The Daleks were the supreme beings. They might be delayed in their conquest of the known galaxies, but they could not fail for long. Even the mighty Time Lords had fallen before them, with only Ka-Faraq-Gatri, the Ancient Enemy, left alive.

The Dalek paused and extended its primary sensor apparatus. A complete scan of the surrounding area showed a high concentration of sentients to be exterminated located in a large room a few hundred metres away. However, the scan also showed a powerful force shield functioning as a barrier. If it was going to succeed in exterminating the filth, then the Dalek needed to find a way to disable the energy barrier first.

The Dalek paused momentarily to run through the possible solutions and then, once it had decided upon the most efficient solution, it continued onwards up the ornately decorated corridor.

Suddenly, the structure's sound system buzzed to life. The Dalek paused again as its sensors picked up a signal being broadcast. Seconds later a voice echoed around the stone corridors of the Goa'uld's fortress.

"Hello!" it said cheerfully in a voice the Dalek identified as coming from a humanoid male. "Calling the Dalek! I do hope you're listening, 'cos this message is especially for you! This is the Doctor! Not just any medic, _the Doctor_."

As the Dalek instinctively shuddered back a few inches the voice spoke again, a note of challenge in it. "You want to be the Dalek who killed the Last Time Lord? I'm in the throne room. _Come and get me!_"

###

"So. . . " Sam asked the Doctor once he stepped away from the transmitter in the security terminal, to the First Prime's visible relief. "You think you got the crazy pepper-pot's attention?"

Just as she finished her question, the sound system crackled to life again and a tinny shriek echoed throughout the Goa'uld base.

"_EXTERMINATE_! _EXTERMINATE! THE DOCTOR WILL BE EXTERMINATED! YOU WILL ALL BE EXTERMINATED! EX-TER-MIN-ATE!"_

"I think we can take that as a yes," Major Carter announced.

Ba'al turned to his guards, his black robe swishing impressively as he moved. "Jaffa! Kree!" he ordered. Instantly, the warriors moved into their pre-arranged positions.

Sam blinked. "Why did the evil overlord just say 'Yoo-hoo'?" she asked.

"Tardis translator," the Doctor said with a shrug. "Closest equivalent phrase."

"Yeah, but . . . _Yoo-hoo?_"


	14. The Plan: Step Two

There was a flurry of activity in Ba'al's throne room as the both humans and Jaffa prepared for the Dalek's approach. The tinny cries of EX-TER-MIN-ATE! still echoed from the hijacked communication system, a Jaffa at the security terminal trying in vain to cut off the Dalek's access. The rest of the Jaffa and SG-1 had taken up defensive positions behind the pillar which lined the room. The Doctor had his screwdriver out and was using it to enhance O'Neill's P-90, hopefully making it effective against the Dalek's defences.

Sam, as the only person without any kind of weapon, was crouching behind Ba'al's throne, looking both displeased and somewhat relieved that the Doctor and O'Neill had insisted she stay behind the force-field that protected the dais which Ba'al's throne stood upon. Ba'al had not bothered to disagree. As a warrior the teenager was useless, so there was no point in insisting that she fight.

_Besides,_ the System Lord thought as he readied his own weapon, _protecting the girl benefits me also. Once the Dalek is defeated, I will need leverage to make the Doctor repair my weapon. A live hostage will do nicely._

A loud explosion echoed from just outside the door and a dark spot appeared halfway up the metal. Sparks spat from it and there was an odd whistling sound. The dark spot became a line that stretched downwards, blackening the metal.

"Incoming!" O'Neill called. "That thing is cutting through the door. Doc, how long have we got?"

"The Dalek will be through that door in less than a minute," the Doctor replied tensely. "Get ready."

"Already am, Doc," O'Neill assured him, glancing at the rest of his team. Daniel and Carter nodded back, weapons at the ready. Teal'c grunted.

"Jaffa!" Ba'al called out, anxious not to be outdone by the Time Lord and the Taur'i. "Kree!"

Amidst the sound of the Jaffa readying their staff weapons, the sound of snickering echoed from behind the throne. Ba'al scowled and as he activated his personal shield, began to inwardly list the options for dealing with certain humans once they'd outlived their usefulness.

Then the scorched black line reached the floor and the slab of metal that had been the door collapsed inwards. Laser blasts zipped through the air as the Jaffa started to fire. However, when they hit the Dalek, it's shield glowed and fizzled briefly from the impact, but did not deactivate.

"EXTERMINATE!" the Dalek screeched, returning fire. "EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!" Shots from it's laser struck the Jaffa. One by one they began to glow briefly as if x-rayed and then collapse.

From his position next to the throne, Ba'al frowned and turned to Sam. "It is only targeting my Jaffa. Why is this?" he demanded.

"Technology," Sam replied, keeping her head down. "Your men's weapons are technically more advanced technology than the weapons SG-1 have. The Dalek probably detected that when it did a scan, so it thinks they're more dangerous."

"My Jaffa are superior adversaries," Ba'al insisted. "The Taur'i cannot compare to their skill.

"Yeah," Sam said, a tremble in her voice as she watched another Jaffa scream and collapsed. "Yeah, I can see that."

O'Neill, who was dodging the ricocheting laser shots that had begun to bounce off the Dalek's slowly weakening force-field, raised his weapon, ready to fire.

Then Doctor gripped his shoulder, stopping him at the last second. "Wait," the Doctor hissed as the Dalek moved slowly forward, levitating above the metal slab it had cut from the door, completely ignoring the laser blasts that the Jaffa continued to shoot at it. "Not yet. It won't have any effect. Wait, wait-"

"YOU ARE THE DOC-TOR," the Dalek screeched. "YOU WILL BE EXTERMINATED!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," the Doctor retorted over the noise of the laser-fire. "You're not the first to tell me that, but you will be the last."

"YOU WILL BE EX-TER-MIN-ATED!" the Dalek shrieked, it's tinny ear-splitting voice rising to a fever-pitch as it's shield continued to fizzle and glow under the fire of the Jaffa warriors.

"THEN STOP TALKING AND DO IT ALREADY!" the Doctor roared, discreetly slipping his hand into his pocket as he did so.

Enraged, the Dalek shot forward- and the Doctor brought his thumb down hard on the sonic screwdriver's control button. An energy field sprang to life around the Dalek as it tried to pass between the first two columns of the throne room. The Dalek shrieked and shuddered, shaking violently as it tried to pass through the shield. It's own force field fizzled- and died.

"Now!" the Doctor yelled.

SG-1 opened fire.

###

As the bullets flew and ricocheted off of the Dalek's armour, Sam crouched down as much as possible and covered her head with her hands. She heard a contemptuous snort above her and briefly uncurled one hand to aim a particular gesture in the System Lord's direction. And then stifled a scream of pain as the offending limb was bent backwards with bruising force.

"I am a god, girl," Ba'al hissed in her ear while SG-1 and the Doctor were distracted trying to blind the Dalek. "Be very careful how you address me."

"Go take a long walk off a short pier," Sam snarled at him, trying not to start crying from the pain in her wrist. "If you're a god, you slimy piece of crud, then I'm a Cyberman."

Ba'al did not deign to reply. Instead he twisted the girl's wrist again. Her cry of pain was lost in the rattle and crack of the gunfire.

###

Eventually, as the Doctor would predicted would happen, one of SG-1 got in a lucky shot. A bullet struck the Dalek's eyepiece dead on and it cracked, creating a shower of sparks.

"MY VISION IS IMPAIRED!" the Dalek screeched. "EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!" It fired wildly, hitting a luckless Jaffa, who screamed briefly before collapsing just as the others had.

"Good to know Cyclops. Thanks for the info," Jack muttered, shooting another round at the Dalek. "Carter! Teal'c!" he yelled over the noise. "Throw it now!"

A second went by, and then two staff weapon power-cell-enhanced C5 explosives slid underneath the levitating machine maniac. "Everybody down!" the Colonel ordered, his voice growing hoarse as he yelled to be heard.

For a second, the Dalek's eyepiece rotated uselessly. Then the explosives carried out their purpose, cutting the Dalek off right in the middle of it's last cry of 'EXTERMINATE'. Metal and debris flew across the room, forcing Jaffa and human alike to duck ungracefully in order to avoid being hit by it.

Then there was silence.

"Well," the Doctor said cheerily, wiping a stray bit of slime off of his shoulder, "that's that then."

"I hardly think so Doctor," Ba'al said in a smooth voice. "Now that the intruder is defeated, you will repair my weapon."

"Oh please," the Doctor sighed, turning on the spot to face the System Lord. "I said no. What in the world makes you think I'm going to change my mind now. . . " He trailed off slowly, taking in the sight in front of him. Ba'al stood in front of his throne with one hand over Sam's mouth and his opposite arm around her neck.

For a second there was nothing but silence, but then the Jaffa, seeing their leader had the upper hand, levelled their weapons at the Doctor and SG-1. As Sam's teeth bit into it, Ba'al broke off his sentence and gave a grunt of pain, pulling his hand away. Sam scrabbled vainly at the arm around her neck, digging sharp nails into it, but Ba'al ignored her attempts at freedom. Instead he tightened his arm around her neck, causing her to let out choked gasp.

As the Doctor made to step forward, Ba'al shook his head warningly. "Do not move Doctor," he ordered. "As I'm sure you know, host bodies of the Goa'uld are more powerful than ordinary humans." He tightened his grip again and Sam began to gasp frantically for air. "If you try anything, I will not hesitate to snap her neck." He smirked. "That applies to you and your team also, O'Neill."

"Yeah, we guessed that," O'Neill said sarcastically. "So what now, O dark master of evil bathrobes?"

"Now O'Neill, the Doctor repairs my weapon and then you die."

"Well gee, that's original," Daniel muttered behind the Colonel. "Haven't heard that one a hundred times already. Oh wait. . ." Despite the direness of the situation, O'Neill's lips twitched into a grin.

"Silence!" Ba'al roared. "Doctor, you will repair my weapon, or your young friend dies."

"No."

The quiet defiance seemed to echo through the room.

"What?" Ba'al demanded.

"No," the Doctor repeated. His voice was calm and his face was composed.

Ba'al tightened his grip again and Sam's struggles began to slow as the lack of air started to affect her. "If you do not do as I say, she _will _die Doctor," Ba'al told him.

"I know," the Doctor said sadly. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

Ba'al stared. "You will not do what is required to save her?" he said, disbelief dripping from his voice. "You expect me to believe that you would leave your friend to die?"

"Yes," the Doctor replied. "What else can I do? Repair the weapon? No. It's too dangerous. I'd be trading Sam's life for that of half the population of the Earth. And I can't do that. I can't put one girl's life ahead of millions of people."

"You are not human," Ba'al pointed out, "why should you care what happens to the Earth? Repair my weapon and your friend may live."

"No."

Ba'al glared furiously at the Doctor for a moment, before loosening his grip slightly. As Sam began to gulp in breaths of air, the System Lord grabbed her already bruised wrist with his free hand and twisted it viciously.

Sam screamed.

The Doctor froze. His jaw was clenched in anger and his skin seemed somehow too tight, more like a mask than a face. "Ba'al," he said quietly. "I swear to you, I will make you regret what you just did a thousand times over."

The System Lord smiled, the genial expression making his face handsome and charming. And then he twisted his captive's arm again.

Utter rage seemed to steam off the Doctor as Sam let out another howl of pain. The expression on his face would have easily sent a thousand cowards running for their lives. But Ba'al just continued to smile.

"You see how it is, Doctor," he said cheerfully. "Either you help me, or your friend suffers. The more time you waste, the more pain she experiences. So I ask you for the last time, will you repair my weapon now?"

The Doctor blew out a breath and then stared Ba'al straight in the eye. "One person's pain is less important than three billion lives. No, I will not repair that weapon."

"So be it," Ba'al hissed "the girl dies." And as he began to slowly tighten his grip on the teenager's neck, the Doctor reached into his pocket for his sonic screwdriver and then activated it. Ba'al gave a shout of surprise as a piercing noise filled the room and the remaining Jaffa warriors groaned in pain and clutched at their symbiote pouches.

The pitch of the sonics increased and began to affect Ba'al. However, he reacted quite differently to the Jaffa. Ba'al released his grip on Sam and clutched his head, letting out an agonised scream of pain. Freed from the Goa'uld's stranglehold, Sam dropped to the floor, choking and coughing for breath. Quickly, Carter grabbed her arm and began pulling her away from the screaming System Lord.

Sam staggered to her feet as Carter half-dragged her across the room. Quickly, the humans exited the room, with the Doctor bringing up the rear, his sonic screwdriver still buzzing in an uncomfortably high pitch and held out threateningly towards the downed System Lord and the Jaffa.

###

"What now O'Neill?" Teal'c enquired as they rushed down a stone-walled corridor. The big Jaffa was carrying a dizzy and disorientated Sam on his back and had temporarily traded his encumbering Staff Weapon for a lighter, much smaller handgun which he could still wield while carrying the teenager.

"Now we get the hell out of Dodge," O'Neill replied. "Doc, how long is whatever you did gonna last?"

"And what _did _you do?" Carter asked.

"Ten minutes and specialized sonic frequency," the Doctor replied absently, looking worriedly at Sam, who seemed to have passed out.. "Goa'uld symbiotes find it objectionable."

"There's the understatement of the year," Jack muttered. "But it's beside the point. You're rescued, Ba'al's defeated, now let's get to the Stargate and get the hell out of here."

"Ahh," the Doctor said slowly.

"Ahh? What do you mean ahh?"

The Doctor gave a polite cough. "There's a slight problem with your plan Colonel."

"And that would be. . ."

The Doctor coughed again, clearing his throat. "I disabled the weapon," he explained, "but I didn't destroy it. Ba'al's intelligent. Eventually he will work out how to repair it himself. If we don't want this whole thing to be for nothing, we have to destroy the weapon now."

"And how exactly do we do that?" O'Neill snapped in irritation.

"Use the rest of the explosives," the Doctor shrugged. "I've still got more than enough left."

The Colonel blinked. "Huh. Yeah. Good plan," he agreed. "Let's go."


	15. Boom

Bwuh. . ." Sam said fuzzily as her vision swam and the world came back into focus and the blur in front of her resolved it self into the concerned face of Daniel Jackson.. Distantly, she noted that her neck and wrist, having been on the receiving end of abuse recently, were now forming a queue to complain. Oh, and the floor she was lying on was freezing cold. She groaned slightly as Daniel helped her sit up. "Wha . . . happen?" she rasped.

"You fainted," the Doctor said, his voice coming from behind her. "We're in Ba'al's laboratory. I'm setting the remaining explosives to take out the Dalek weapon and our military friends over there are guarding the door. I set up a another force-field, but the Jaffa are wearing it down pretty fast. Get ready to run. Once I'm finished, we're going to make a break for the Tardis."

"Well thank you for that precise exposition," Sam muttered. She raised her head dizzily and noted that everything was pretty much as the Doctor had said. The tall skinny Time Lord was indeed tinkering with dangerous looking explosive material, and the rest of SG-1 were stationed at the half-open door to the lab, which was covered by a curtain of shimmering blue energy, their weapons at the ready. Periodically, a laser blast would hit it and it would fizzle alarmingly.

Colonel O'Neill glanced towards the Doctor. "How's it comin' Doc?" he asked impatiently. "I hate to rush you, but the Jaffa are kinda wearing down our defences here"- there was a howl of rage from the hallway as an explosive hit the force-field and failed to break it- "and it looks like Ba'al's back on his feet," Jack finished.

"Almost done," the Doctor replied tetchily as continued to fiddle with the explosives. "Stop rushing me," he said, waving vaguely in O'Neill's direction with the sonic screwdriver. "This is precise work"

"It's supposed to go boom," Sam muttered sulkily, rubbing at her bruised wrist. "How precise can it possibly be? I want to get out of here already."

"Depends on if you want time to get away, or just time to say 'Oh crap' before it goes off in your face," Daniel opined mildly..

Sam sighed. "Forget I said anything."

"I will. Thank you."

"I wasn't talking to you, Doctor."

The Doctor frowned. "Are you having one of your 'immature teenager' moments again?" he asked curiously.

Sam glared. "I do _not_ have immature-"

"Oh. Finished!" the Doctor exclaimed, interrupting her. "Right. Let's get out of here."

"Through that secret passage way?" Sam said doubtfully. "Won't that just bring us back down to Ba'al's dungeon?"

"It would," the Doctor agreed, "but I was, in fact, thinking of another escape route. Since this _is_ a room with a secret passage leading to it in a Goa'uld fortress and where there are secret passages in Goa'uld fortresses there are-"

"Transport rings!" Daniel exclaimed.

The Doctor gave him a look. "Hey! I was just about to say that."

"Oh. Sorry."

"Anyway," the Doctor continued, still sounding a little put out, "I've already found the Ring controls, so give me a few more minutes to reconfigure them and I can get it to drop us right outside the Tardis. Problem solved."

Then the force-field collapsed.

###

Back at Cheyenne Mountain Airbase, General Hammond's day had just got a whole lot worse. Frustrated with the lack of noticeable headway from his subordinate, Woolsey's boss, one Robert Kane, had made an appearance at Stargate Command, and as Woolsey had vacated the facility earlier that day after finishing off a slice of pie in the cafeteria, Kane had decided to go straight to Hammond.

Kane was a heavy-set man in his late fifties, whose salt and pepper hair was going thin on top. He had tried to rectify the situation by combing over, but seemed not to have a very good mirror, as there was still a rather large and obvious bald spot visible on the back of his head. He was also by far one of the oiliest men that Hammond had ever met. Every sentence from his mouth dripped with so much false sincerity that the general was half-surprised that there wasn't a small puddle on the floor.

"Really General," the man was saying as Hammond shuffled some paperwork and tried valiantly to look as if he was always happy to co-operate fully with the senior members of the IOA, "I don't know how Woolsey could have failed to impress upon you the seriousness of the situation. Surely, if some alien visitor is abducting citizens of this planet then the _International _Oversight Advisory has a duty to protect them? Clearly

"You have _read _the reports Mr. Kane?" Hammond interrupted, growing tired of the mans politicking.

"Well, of course," Kane replied in apparent grave concern. "Apparently Ms. Sullivan is not the first young woman he's abducted. According to UNIT, the list is over twenty name long, men on it as well."

Hammond coughed politely. "According to the British government, he's never abducted anyone. All of his companions chose to go with him willingly."

Kane laughed unpleasantly. "Well, yes, I don't know how, but he's clearly taken the Brits for a ride. But surely you aren't going to allow this Doctor to fool the USAF too, General? He's an alien, we can't be sure what kind of persuasive powers he has. And as for their claims that he's-"

"A hero," Hammond finished for him.

"Yes, exactly! They've only got-"

"Over a hundred eyewitness accounts, from unimpeachable sources, of him repeatedly saving the planet, the solar system, the galaxy and on a few occasions the whole of creation?"

"Unimpeachable European witnesses," Kane pointed out quickly after a brief faltering moment, contriving to indicate that such non-American sources could hardly be trusted . "And a few Chinese ones. The communists-"

_That. Is. It._ Hammond thought as Kane talked on, continuing to insinuate and dismiss anything not fitting his worldview. _I had it with this self-important blowhard. He's even worse than Woolsey. At least that man has a few redeeming qualities. Now where did I put that envelope Major Davis found? Aha . ._

"Mr. Kane," Hammond snapped, pushing an envelope into Kane's hands and interrupting the man's diatribe. "I suggest you look at the contents of that envelope. It was sent over by the records people at the Pentagon. Since you are not convinced by forty years of UNIT records, perhaps the author of these papers can convince you of the Doctor's goodwill. Oh and before you ask," he added as Kane carefully removed the delicate manuscript from the envelope, "those documents have been verified by multiple labs in multiple states. They are authentic."

Kane looked contemptuously at Hammond for a moment before glancing at the century and a half old document. His jaw dropped, his face turning chalk-white. "But, this can't possibly be right. It must be a forgery!"

"As I said before," Hammond replied, "I assure you, it is authentic."

"There must be some mistake," Kane insisted. "It must be a trick of some sort. Even if the age of the documents is correct, their contents can't be correct. It's a lie. It has to be."

"Mr. Kane, are you accusing the President of lying?"

"God knows other ones did!" Kane spluttered. "Look at that mess with Clinton. And Richard Nixon!"

Hammond's smile turned shark-like. "Let me get this absolutely straight, Mr Kane. Are you, or are you not, calling President Abraham Lincoln a liar?"

"What? No! But," Kane stammered helplessly, "I mean-"

"Because according to those document, signed by President Lincoln himself," Hammond continued, "the space traveller known as the Doctor is to be awarded all courtesies and honours, for vital services to the United States of America in a time of great emergency and peril. Anyone found wilfully harming or impeding him and his-" Hammond cleared his throat and looked at the document-"what was the phrase President Lincoln used? Oh yes, ' the Doctor and his resourceful assistant', is to be arrested and charged with treason." He looked at Kane, who seemed to be close to having a fit. "Attempting to use the girl as a lab rat sounds like wilful harm to me, Mr. Kane. But as you were not aware of the law, I'm sure you can be let off with a warning. The door's over there. Don't let it hit you on your way out."

###

"Jaffa! Kree!" Ba'al roared as the force-field protecting the laboratory door finally went down and a sudden hail of bullets spat out into the hallway. "I want the Doctor alive, but kill the rest! Kill them!"

Ba'al's first prime and his warriors did their best, but SG-1 had the advantage of a more defensible position and the fight became a stalemate, with both sides exchanging token fire. Still, Kyprac figured, it was he and his men who had the advantage. The taur'i's projectile weapons might be more precise and damaging than staff weapons, but they relied on a finite amount of ammunition. Their guns would run out of bullets much faster than the power packs of the Jaffa staff weapons would run down. All he had to do was continue to draw their fire and stay alive long enough to outlast their ammunition. Then capture would be a simple matter.

"Keep firing!" Kyprac ordered his men. "Force them to retaliate." Out of the corner of his eye, Kyprac noticed Lord Ba'al nod in approval. Perhaps some glory could be salvaged from this wretched day after all, he thought. Already, the Taur'i's hail of bullets was beginning to thin, as the humans changed their tactics to conserve ammunition. Kyprac let out of a cry of triumph and urged his men on. Finally, victory was within his grasp.

Then the sound of gunfire and the hail of bullets stopped completely. "Charge!" Kyprac roared, as he rushed down the hallway into the laboratory, his men barely a step behind him.

But it was too late. Just as he made it to the doorway, the First Prime saw the Taur'i and their accomplices surrounded by a shaft of light before the tell-tale sound of the transport rings activated and they vanished. "The controls!" he snapped at the closest Jaffa. "See to the controls. I want to know exactly where they've transported to. Immediately."

The luckless Jaffa, a youngster on his first year of service who'd been given a place in Ba'al's guard because of his talent for technology, snapped off a salute and rushed to the nearest terminal, which was now a pile of sparking wires. "My Lord, the controls have been badly damaged. I don't know if I can repair them."

"Then I suggest you find someone else who can," a smooth voice said icily. The young Jaffa turned to see who had spoken and gulped.

Kyprac bowed as Lord Ba'al entering the room, the thunderous scowl on his face at odds with his calmly furious tone of voice. "My Lord," he greeted the System Lord, "the Taur'i have escaped. They used the Ring Transport."

"Kyprac," Ba'al said, a genial smile appearing on his face in place of the furious scowl, "my faithful servant, when I appointed you to your position, I am sure it was because you had more skills than just. _Stating. The. Obvious! _Now find them!"

"I- We are trying, My Lord!" Kyprac assured his angry God desperately. "Do not worry. Soon the Taur'i and the Doctor will be your prisoners once again! I will not fail in this, I swear it!"

"Very well," Ba'al decided. "Your God is gracious, Kyprac." _And qualified First Primes are at a premium right now, thanks to the Taur'i, so I can't afford to waste you._ "But fail me once more and you will spend the rest of your existence in agony."

"Thank you, My Lord," Kyprac said gratefully. "I shall not disappoint you again."

Ba'al turned away from Kyprac, waving off his thanks and sighed. "At least they did not manage to destroy my weapon," he murmured to himself, walking over to it. "As soon as it is repaired, I will. . ." Ba'al trailed off, his attention caught be a small blinking light at the base of the shining black device. He peered closer and found that it was caused by a display of red-lit numbers counting down. 7. . . 6. . . 5 . . . 4 . . .

It took exactly half a second for Ba'al to realise that his prized possession was about to explode.

"Out!" he roared. "Get out of my way!"

###

_Boom._


	16. Epilogue: Goodbye

The Doctor, Sam, and the other members of SG-1 sat on the stone platform supporting the Stargate as Daniel Jackson entered Earth's address into the Dial Home Device. Off in the distance, they could see a black cloud of smoke

"Huh," Major Carter said, watching the thick black smoke rise over Ba'al's compound. "You think Ba'al got out alive?"

"Hard to tell," the Doctor answered slowly, shading his eyes against the sun. "Ba'al's death wasn't fixed point in time. He could very well have made it out."

"Is it just me," O'Neill said suspiciously, "or do you not sound too upset by that possibility?"

The Doctor turned to face the human soldier. "Whatever else he is, Colonel, Ba'al is a living being. He has as much right to life as anything else in the universe."

"You can't seriously believe that," Daniel protested earnestly. "This is Ba'al we're talking about. And as I remember, you were pretty geared up to kill him when we found you back Ba'al's dungeon."

The Doctor shrugged and glanced at the Stargate. The inner ring spun as the chevrons began to light up. "I was. . . not myself. And as _I_ remember, your allies the Tok'ra are genetically the same species as the Goa'uld. They were born because one Goa'uld queen looked at what her people were doing and said: 'No. I will not be part of this.' Do you believe that it's impossible that it could happen again?"

"And you believe Ba'al could change, if we just gave him a chance?" Carter said incredulously.

The Doctor gazed steadily back at her. "Honestly? Him? No. But I do like to hope. Hope's a good emotion. Remember that."

"There will come a time when all that is left is hope, and your people shall look to it and fight for their future and freedom," Teal'c quoted. He looked at the Doctor. "Is that not what you said to the first Shol'va?"

The Doctor grinned. "Yep. Solan, son of Karyen. Good man, that. He achieved so much."

"He was executed by Ra," Teal'c pointed out.

"He managed to start an order dedicated to freedom for the Jaffa that lasted thousands of years," the Doctor replied. "Pretty big achievement I should think. As for executed. . ." the Doctor said with a mischievous grin, "well, a programmed bio-holographic duplicate is very hard to spot unless you're looking for it, and I'm pretty sure Ra wasn't."

Teal'c blinked. "The first Shol'va . . . he lived?"

"Mmm," the Doctor confirmed, sucking his teeth. "For about fifty years after his 'execution' as I recall. Now, are you all sure that you don't want a lift in the Tardis? Much safer way to travel than by Stargate."

Sam snorted.

O'Neill took one long look at the blue box. "Yes," he said firmly, holding up a hand to pre-emptively silence Daniel and Carter.

"Oh? Are you sure?" the Doctor asked disappointedly. "I could have you back minutes after you left! We could take a detour. Go to Barcelona! Not the city Barcelona, the planet Barcelona, how 'bout it?"

"Thanks, but no thanks Doc," O'Neill declined. "I've already had enough time travel to last me a lifetime."

The Doctor blinked. "Time travel? You've-?"

"Solar Flare," Carter explained. "The Stargate dropped us in 1969."

"Ah." The Doctor nodded. "Good year."

"Er, done," Daniel declared, as the last chevron lit up and the energy wave whooshed out from the circle and then retreated.

"Right then," O'Neill said, shaking the Doctor's hand. "Nice workin' with you folks. Drop by the Earth again sometime." He gave the Doctor a sharp look. "And look after the kid. Otherwise you an' I'll be having words."

"Indeed," Teal'c agreed.

###

_Stargate Command, 2010._

Lieutenant General Jack O'Neill signed his name on another requisition form and stifled a groan of frustration. He had to worry about a possible resurgence of a Goa'uld System Lord, the political manoeuvring of some of the Lucian Alliance, not to mention the myriad of problems associated with the Destiny, and what was he doing right now?

Signing forms. Hurray for paper work.

Suddenly and bizarrely, a wind picked up inside the office, scattering the paperwork, and a groaning, grunting sound like an elephant in serious distress filled the air. As O'Neill watched, a light began to flash in mid air and a tall rectangular outline began to appear. Eventually, a tall blue box stood in the centre of the General's office and a skinny man, with messy brown hair, dressed in a pinstripe suit, emerged from it.

"Colonel O'Neill!" the Doctor declared happily. "Good to see you again!"

"Doctor," the O'Neill greeted the Time Lord, rising from his chair. "To what do I owe this visit? And it's Lieutenant General now, thanks."

"Oh, just letting you know that Sam and I were doing some sightseeing in a nearby galaxy, when we came across some stranded people on an Alteran ship," the Doctor replied. He bounced forward and caught O'Neill's hand in a clasp of friendship. "We thought you'd appreciate knowing we gave them and the ship a lift home. They should be orbiting earth," he paused and checked his watch, "about three minutes from now. Sam should be with them. She decided to stay there and help with medical supplies while I delivered the news."

O'Neill grinned and slapped the Doctor on the back. "Hah! So, now that you've solved that problem, do you think you could do something about the new green jello they insist on serving in the cafeteria?"

"Sorry General, I'm a Time Lord, not a miracle worker."

"Oh well. Never mind. Say Doc, you ever been fishing?"


End file.
